Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Cinder was awake long before Adri or Pearl. Peony stirred next to her as she sat up and swung her legs off the bed. A smile crossed her face. Peony must have had a nightmare and come to her for comfort in the middle of the night. The smile fell as Cinder remembered why she’d be having nightmares.

Reaping day.

She pushed herself to her feet, ignoring the stiff metal joints in her left leg, and walked the three meters across the room to the door. She could have slept more today. No shops were open on reaping day. But she knew that Adri would have had some choice words if she hadn’t worked anyway, organizing the shop or fixing the car, even if she couldn’t sell today.

Two hour later, lost in the gears and machine oil and wires, Cinder barely noticed when Peony walked in. For once, she wasn’t chattering about boys or television shows. She just sat on her chair (the only clean space in the shop) and watched as Cinder whacked a rusted bolt off a customer’s transport bike. The reaping started in two hours, which means she was probably sent by her mother to make sure Cinder was getting ready so she wouldn’t be an embarrassment to the Linh family.

They’d have to leave soon so the two minors could be checked in by the registrars, and Adri and Pearl would saunter their way over to the adult section of the audience an hour afterward.

Of course Pearl hadn’t been reaped. Her name was in the pool the minimum number of times until she finally aged out. It was the same for Peony. Cinder’s name was in the reaping more, though. Not many people in 3 took out tesserae, but she had, a few times for herself when it was clear that Adri was trying to starve her into submission, and then more when Adri realized she could sell the food from the tesserae to buy herself more luxuries, scant as they were. That’s also where all the money from the mechanic shop went.

Cinder sighed, dropping her head against the transport bike. She should probably get ready.

Pulling off her filthy work gloves, she stood and smiled at Peony, who perked up, clearly trying to pull a veil of normality over the day. Her chattering wasn’t as animated as usual as they headed back to the tiny room Cinder could call her own, but at least she was trying.

“I’m sure you heard, but Kaito is a mentor for these games, the first since he won two years ago.” Cinder nodded, knowing where this was going. Peony loved Kaito, though he rarely left the Victor’s Village, so they never got to see him. Hence her excitement. “That means he’s going to be at the reaping! And he’ll be showing up on the broadcasts of the games!”

Cinder pulled on her one good outfit, a t-shirt and pants free of machine grease, as Peony continued to talk about Kai. She wasn’t wrong about him--he was both attractive and noble, having won his games with a minimum of killing, and all clean kills as well, not drawing it out like some of the victors in the past had.

As a last touch to her outfit, Cinder tugged on her new pair of gloves. She got one new pair each year. After the reaping, she’d throw out last year's work gloves and these ones would take their place. Though really, with how much time she spent in the shop, the gloves wore through faster than that. For the past two months or so, she’d been working without a glove on her left hand. Metal, like her leg, it couldn’t feel pain, so Cinder had used that glove to patch up the holes in the other one. 

Adri had, a few years ago, used the last last of her husband’s life insurance to get them an apartment near the hall of justice. She thought it was more fashionable, as if district 3 could ever be fashionable. It meant, though, that they could walk out the front door and be at the reaping. They didn’t need to walk miles, or hitch a ride on an old diesel truck belching fumes in their faces. The threat of death was outside the kitchen window every day.

Peony and Cinder were separated by age, and she pulled off the glove on her right hand so they could prick her finger and take blood. This wasn’t Peony’s first year in the reaping, so she knew where to go, but she still looked over at Cinder, anxious. She returned a reassuring smile, and took her own place with the other sixteen year olds.

The square filled up slowly. Some of the people were dressed like Peony, in nice dresses or suits, but many were like Cinder, just wearing the cleanest clothes they could find, not owning anything much nicer than their factory uniforms. As awful as Adri and Pearl were, treating her like dirt and taking all the money she earned from my shop, Cinder was constantly grateful she didn't work in the factories. At the mechanic shop, she got to choose what she did, fixing things and seeing a project through from beginning to end. She wasn’t part of a giant assembly line, driving the same four rivets all day.

The time of the reaping finally came, and Cinder watched as the cameras around the square switched on, broadcasting to the capitol, and all the other districts if they cared to watch. The film played, the same one they show every year (Cinder can’t help but think the capitol must be sick of watching it if they see it on all twelve reaping broadcasts), and then the escort for our district took the mic. Despite the gravity of the situation, Cinder grinned. 

Iko was a delight. She was from district three, and had been friends with Cinder for years, since Linh Garan brought her here at age 11, with no memory. Iko had been 18, and had just netted a contract as a Capitol escort, but still took time to become Cinder’s friend. Any time she was in 3 they spent as much time together as they could. Cinder sometimes wondered how she managed to get the job as an escort, since it was so rare for someone from the districts, but it also kind of made sense. She looked like she belonged in the capitol, first of all, with flawless dark skin and bright blue braids. She’d even gotten her makeup tattooed on, after she got to the Capitol, of course, but unlike most of the capitol luxury junkies, she’d kept it subtle enough to stay beautiful. And she had a sort of magnetism to her personality that screamed “Capitol.” 

Up on stage she introduced the mentors, first Sybil Mira, who spent most of her time in the Capitol. She always wore all white and looked ageless, though Cinder knew it had been almost thirty years since she had won her games. They were not clean games, either. For the few years after her, even the careers had been hesitant to mess with district 3. 

Following her onto the stage was Kaito. He was only 17, but was now a mentor himself. Though Cinder didn’t have the same celebrity crush on him that Peony (or most of the girls under the age of twenty) had, she couldn’t deny that she flushed a little as he stepped onto the stage. He was wearing a blue waistcoat with a high mandarin collar over a white shirt with flowing sleeves, gathered at the wrist. His black pants were tucked into scuffed combat boots, the only part of his look that didn’t seem curated.

For a few months after his games, people had called him “Prince Kaito,” or even “Emperor Kaito” a few times, before he quickly shut it down. One guess why.

Cinder’s attention shifted back to Iko. “I will now choose the tributes for the 50th Hunger Games. Remember, this is a Quarter Quell, and as a reminder that two rebels died for every Capitol citizen, twice the number of regular tributes will be sent into the arena.” She pulled the mic out of its stand and walked over to the first globe, filled with slips of paper. Cinder tensed, holding her breath. “Ladies first.”

She solemnly reached into the reaping bowl and pulled out a name. “Linh Peony.”

The breath rushed from Cinder’s lungs and the blood drained from her face. The one person in the whole district that she would die for, and Peony was going to be dying for no reason at all.

Cinder shoved her way through the crowd, as on the opposite side of the aisle the people parted to let Peony walk through, stunned and terrified. They reached the middle at the same time. Cinder grabbed her little sister’s arm and pulled her behind. “I volunteer as tribute!”

Iko looked at Cinder in silence for a few heartbeats. She could tell Iko wanted to say something, but wasn’t able, constrained by her role as the capitol’s representative. Instead she waved Cinder forward. She let go of Peony, who was still frozen in place, and stepped onto the stage. Following protocol, Iko asked Cinder her name, but her voice cracked. Cinder could see herself in the screens around the square. She had a smudge of black engine grease on her forehead. She wanted to run, but instead walked to her place, marked on the stage by an X. The tape marker she stood on curled up on the edges. It had been there for a long time.

Iko reached into the bowl and drew a second name. “Linh Cinder.”

Cinder almost laugh. She would have been in the games anyway, whether she volunteered or not. Since she was already on stage, Iko drew another name. “Cress Darnel.”

A short girl with long, wild hair walked from the crowd of 16 year olds and stood next to Cinder on the dais. She was the same age as her, but Cinder had never seen her before. Like Peony had been, the Cress girl didn’t seem completely there, but rather than fear and shock, it seemed to be a strange mix of determination and dissociation glazing her eyes.

The boys were called, a fourteen year old in a factory uniform and--Cinder’s heart sank--a twelve year old. Chang Sunto. His mother owned the shop across from hers in the market. She could hear her crying as the peacekeepers led the tributes into the hall of justice.

The door slammed behind them.

Chapter Text

I’m an heiress, speeding on a train toward her inheritance. The pomp and circumstance is for me, the wealth of my future. 

Cress shook her head. She was trying her best to find an imaginary world to live in, like she’d done all her life, but this time it wasn’t working.

I’m a daring adventurer, with a sword at my side--

She cut that one off before it could go any further. Too close to home. Except that she’d never held a sword in her life. She wasn’t even allowed kitchen knives, that’s how little her guardian trusted her. Did she think Cress would attack her? A Hunger Games victor against a slip of a teenager who imagined herself into different places and times, and sang opera in the shower? Please.

Sybil Mira hadn’t come to say goodbye when they were granted time in the hall of justice. That made sense, of course, since she would be traveling with them to the capitol. But Cress didn’t think she’d have bothered to say goodbye even if she would spend the rest of the games off the grid in the woods of district 7. She just didn’t care. There had been no reaction from her when Cress’s name had been called, though she’d probably felt a twinge of disappointment that she’d be losing her best hacker and spy.

Cress had tried not to notice, but there hadn’t been much to do when waiting to say their goodbyes. The other girl, Linh Cinder, had spent most of the hour sitting in silence as well, head in her hands, elbows on her knees, leaning forward on the uncomfortable wooden chair. The only person to visit her had been the girl she’d volunteered for. When she’d stopped by, Cress had made an even greater effort to ignore the other side of the room. Yeah, there were double the tributes this year, but why did they have to put them in the same space for this? It wasn’t like the hall of justice was short on rooms.

A knock rang around her spacious room, and Cress stood, adjusting herself to the movement of the train before walking across the space to open the door. Cinder stood on the other side of the threshold. She’d also changed into the clothes provided for them, though she still wore a pair of work gloves. They were actually wearing the same outfit, and Cress wondered if she’d picked it for the same reason. It was the most comfortable looking thing in the closet.

Cress did her best to smile and not see the girl as a potential enemy, or someone who would be dead in a month. “Hi.”

Cinder returned the smile and shoved her hands in her pocket. “We’re watching the other reapings, if you want to come watch. It might give you an idea of who to avoid, at the very least.”

They walked a few train cars down, and settled next to Sunto on the plush couch. The other boy wasn’t there. He must not have wanted to spend time with them, which Cress could understand. 

The reapings were just starting their first replay on the capitol’s broadcasting system. They’d play almost nonstop for the next day or so until tributes started arriving at the Capitol.

District 1 had pretty standard career tributes. The second girl volunteered, as did the second boy. Cress didn’t pay much attention, until the boy who’d volunteered said his name into the microphone. She sat up straighter in her seat. “Carswell Thorne?”

Cinder looked over at her. “You know who he is?”

She shrank back. She knew all about Carswell. Had pictures of him saved on her desktop back in Sybil Mira’s victor house. But she couldn’t really explain why without telling about all the spying she’d done for Sybil Mira. In reality, in her snooping she’d come across all sorts of reports about his misdeeds: rigging gambling pools, letting a tiger loose from a zoo in the Capitol, stealing a jet-- she couldn’t figure out why he’d volunteer, though. His parents were famous, so he didn’t need more fame, or the money that came with being a victor. Maybe it was simple thrill seeking, but that didn’t track with his explanations of why he’d done the things he did: Donating money to charity, helping the tiger to freedom, ect.

What she said in response to Cinder was just, “I’ve heard of him. His parents are famous.”

Cinder raised an eyebrow. “Have you seen pictures of him as well? You’re turning red all the way to your ears.”

She ignored the pointed question about the very good looking tribute who would probably kill her, and diverted attention back to the reapings, which were now showing district two.

A name was called, and a gasp rang through the audience in district one, as well as the one in the train car. It was Winter Hayle, step-daughter of President Levana. The story was well known across the districts. Levana had married a peacekeeper, which was scandalous enough to the citizens of the capitol, but he was also recently widowed, his wife having died of Letumosis disease just weeks before. Though it was never acknowledged, many people in the districts believed that most, if not all the people who contracted Letumosis (and therefore died, as there was no cure), were intentional targets. This added to the indignity of the marriage between Levana and Evret Hayle, in the eyes of the districts. 

Winter, Evret’s daughter, was raised mostly in the Capitol, but was still a citizen of district 2, and eligible for the reaping. No one ever thought she would be called though. It made Cress wonder if this was on purpose. If President Levana was worried about the power she held over the people of the Capitol, or wanted to show that no one was safe.

She floated her way onto the dais, easily the most beautiful person on the screen, despite the scars on her cheek. She seemed unbothered by the reaping, and distant to the whole proceeding.

The other girl from two was a volunteer, as were the two boys. The first boy volunteered as soon as he could. He seemed almost anxious to get on stage. Anxious and afraid. As he turned from giving his name, Cress could see his eyes land on Winter, who gave him a smile.

So that’s why he’d volunteered.

Before Cress was ready, the screen had switched to show district three, Iko on the stage, explaining the quarter quell. The first name was drawn, and as Cress remembered, Cinder volunteered for her sister, stepping into place on the stage. The recording was paused, as it was after each tribute, so that Caesar Flickerman could comment on the Volunteer, which was rare for district 3. “Ah, finally one outside of the career districts who wants that honor and distinction of being a tribute. Couldn’t let her sister have it all, could she?”

Cress startled as a boot hit the screen, bouncing off and landing on the ground. “ Seriously?!” 

An angry Cinder stood up, one foot bare--a metal foot--and yelled at Caesar. “An honor?” She kicked the boot, and it once again sailed across the room, thudding against the wall. “I don’t believe these people. And the Capitol citizens believe every word.”

She paced a bit, but sat down as the commentary ended and the recording of the reaping started again, so the other two tributes on the couch could see. Cress watched as her name was called and she walked through the crowd. She thought she looked alright. Not very brave, but she wasn’t crying. She wasn’t staring defiant into space like Cinder, but she stood tall. 

Caesar’s commentary on Cress was short, focusing mainly on her hair. As she studied the image of herself on the screen, Cress realized something. The Capitol was going to try and make that into her image.

The district three reapings ended, and it continued onto district 4. She really should stay and watch, especially the rest of the career pack, but instead she stood and left the room. The way back to her room passed the kitchen car, and she stepped inside, finding a sharp pair of kitchen shears. She had an idea, and wanted to get to work before she was stopped, either by Sybil Mira or her own indecision.

Chapter Text

She almost cried when she saw the horses that would be pulling their chariot. They looked like the family of the ones on the Benoit farm: sturdy, tall work horses with hooves that could squish a man.

She adjusted her outfit, which was (oh so cleverly) a stereotypical “farm girl” dress, blue with white cornflowers, and her flaming red hair was in double braids with a straw hat on top. The other girl from her district, her friend Émilie, was dressed similarly, and the boys from their district were in overalls. They looked like the cover of a book she’d come across in their school one year, with a girl in a straw hat with braided red hair, standing in front of a green and white house. It was an old book. And yet every year the stylists for district 9 managed to put them in costumes that looked almost the same.

Hooray for individuality. Scarlet scoffed. 

More tributes were filing into the area under the tribute center, where the chariots were lined up from districts one to twelve. The space was more packed than it was probably supposed to be, as they had double the chariots to accommodate double the tributes.

She folded her arms and leaned against the chariot, glaring around her. The bustle reminded her of market day back home, but she knew the circumstances were very different.

She looked around herself to assess the other tributes. This was the first time they had all been in the same place. As far as she could tell, standing at a distance as they were, the stylists from one had gone for a military theme, but shiny, which was pretty standard. All the tributes from one were strutting around, reflecting light. Scarlet snorted in amusement.

District two had been dressed as ancient gods and goddesses, she supposed because stone was carved into sculptures or something. Unfortunately, they all pulled it off rather well, the chiseled muscles of people who got enough to eat and trained for the games shown off by the short skirts and artful drapery (and lack thereof, in some cases). It looked as if they had placed the bigger boy in the role of Ares and the thinner one as Hermes. The tall girl was Athena, without question. The step daughter of the president, poor girl, had been placed as Aphrodite, as near as Scarlet could tell. She didn’t have blood spatters or wings or a helm with an owl, that clearly gave it away like the others, but she had been given a peplos that intentionally left her breasts uncovered, tying underneath instead of above. The boy dressed as Hermes looked ready to murder someone on her behalf, whether it was the stylists or the other tributes, some of whom occasionally shot a leer her way.

Scarlet was quite suddenly relieved for the rather plain and unremarkable costume she’d been put in.

She almost didn’t recognize district three. They were usually in something either drab or horrendous. Never classy, and never eye-catching in a good way. Last year they’d been dressed in a giant paper mache one and zero. Pretty easy to beat that style choice out for sponsors. This year, though, they looked great. Scarlet had heard whispers that the district three stylist had died of Letumosis and their escort had taken his place until someone new had been found. Given her showing here, they might keep her as the stylist for a while longer.

Two young boys (as if all the tributes weren’t young) wearing dark blue suits flanked a girl with blonde hair cut to her shoulders. The boys’ outfits looked at first like a standard suit, but as they shifted she could see metallic lines running all over them, circuit boards partially hidden, sewn into the fabric and only flashing occasionally into view. The short blonde girl was wearing a dress that also looked simple at first, but rather than circuit boards, when she moved, Scarlet could see computer code running across the dress, occasionally interspersed with actual portscreens, showing life feed of the games.

The last girl, taller than the others in her district with a serious look on her face, wore a sleeveless top with a high collar, the red carefully woven with mechanical gears and connections that showed up in silver when the light hit right. Her pants were simple and tan, and ended below her knees. Her hands and feet had been left bare, no shoes, socks, or gloves to hide the gleaming metal that made up her left hand and leg.

She looked across the space and caught Scarlet’s gaze, glaring, until Scarlet gave her a serious nod and a small salute.

Scarlet’s survey of the districts was interrupted by a scuffle behind her. She turned to see the male tributes from district ten fighting, two girls dressed as sheep (?) hiding behind the chariot. The taller boy, who looked like the oldest tribute in the games this year, had his hand curled around the throat of a smaller boy, who was laughing in his face. They had similar features and coloring, and Scarlet remembered from her watching the reaping that a pair of brothers had both been reaped in district ten. As she watched, the older brother slammed his younger brother into the side of the chariot, before letting go and turning around, his eyes meeting Scarlet’s. Rather than look away, as her instinct told her, she kept his gaze. 

His eyes were green as April wheat.

Without really thinking about it, she took several deep breaths, and he matched her, calming down, before nodding and stalking away.

The younger brother looked her up and down with interest and she made a rude hand gesture at him, at which he laughed and turned to look at Winter Hayle again. As he had before the brother spat. Both boys were shirtless, wearing pants made of hide and a wolf fur tossed over their shoulders. Scarlet couldn’t help but think that the elder, more built brother wore it much better, despite (or perhaps because of) the multitude of scars that the outfit did nothing to cover.

A horn sounded and the chariots started pulling out of their staging area. Scarlet hurried into place, not paying much attention to the other tributes any more (except district 6, who for some reason were wearing roller blades, stage makeup, and various odd, brightly colored boxes), and the sturdy work horses pulled district nine into the spotlight.

Chapter Text

Thank goodness Iko was their stylist. She’d known exactly what to do to make them look classy but sponsor-worthy, and had put in an order for new prosthetics for Cinder the moment the reaping had ended. As she finally collapsed on her new bed in the tribute center, she couldn’t help but roll her brand new joints, appreciating the smoothness of movement. She hadn’t walked so easy or felt so comfortable in her own skin and wiring in years. Which was both ironic and a crying shame, as she was being put on display for an entire nation and sent to be slaughtered.

As she pulled off her costume and tied the waistband on a pair of sweatpants, Cinder thought of when she’d first come out of the stylist’s rooms, primped and plucked, her mechanic’s arm muscles uncovered, and her metal limbs intentionally on display for the first time in her life. Sybil Mira had given her a sneer of contempt, which Iko had responded to by angrily striding over and berating her.

This had left Cinder with Kai. He’d seemed surprised, and she realized that through the whole reaping and tribute process thus far she’d worn gloves and long pants. He must not have known she was an amputee. She’d shrunk back on herself, but he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder, and for the first time spoke directly to her and only her. “Don’t worry, you look amazing, and Sybil Mira wouldn’t know real beauty or power if it was announced by executive order.”

Cinder had raised an eyebrow and twisted her lips into an amused smile. “Thank you, it’s high praise coming from a man in a ratty hoodie and mismatched socks.”

He’d thrown back his head and laughed. He looked back at her, his smile quirked up on one side, hair falling in front of his eyes, and she was suddenly more aware of the sleeveless nature of her outfit, and his hand which was still on her shoulder, two fingers on her skin.

Laying in her bed four hours later, staring at the ceiling, Cinder thought she might understand what Peony and the other fangirls had been on about.

***

Tribute training. Yay. 

There were only two good things about the training: It would teach her things she needed to survive, and there were no cameras filming them here. 

The woman in charge gave them an overview of what the training center offered and the rules, along with some suggestions, before setting them loose in a chaotic herd. As with most of the things in the tribute center, there was simply not enough room for the quarter quell numbers. Forty eight teenagers was too many to have in this small space, trying to learn with the limited equipment provided.

To avoid the crowds at the weapon racks, fire starting, and climbing, Cinder just picked a random station and tried to look interested. It seemed to be focused on setting traps and snares, both for people and animals. That would probably be useful, so Cinder tried to learn what she could. The trainer seemed almost less interested than she. After half an hour or so, and a couple of successes setting a snare for catching small game, Cinder placed her hands flat on the table. “Alright, do you have anything else here, besides traps? Any other ways to use my surroundings.”

The man’s eyes lit up. “I’ve actually been trying to get them to include a station on this for years, but they say it’s too out there.” He leaned forward. “But I’ll teach you if you want. Making weapons out of what you find in the wilderness around you.”

Cinder nodded at him. “Sounds useful. I’ll take and use whatever you can tell me.”

Blowguns, fire hardened wooden stakes, slings, slingshots, kubatons and strikers, a simple hunting bow and arrows (though Cinder doubted her ability to use that one), a spiked club, atlatl, bola, and more, even stone knives or axes, if she had time to craft them. By the time he’d walked her through the creation of as many weapons as he could and even the use of the ones she hadn’t seen before, the tribute center was almost empty for the evening. They’d missed lunch and dinner.

Cinder shook the trainer’s hand. “Thank you. You’ve helped me prepare more than I ever expected to.”

He dipped his head in a small bow. “Thank you for allowing me to teach what I know.” He gave her a wink. “Unless the other’s ask, like you did, I’ll keep that knowledge between the two of us.”

The hall out of the training center and back to the apartments was empty except for Cinder, until she heard footsteps running along behind her. “Hey, wait up!”

She turned to see one of the district one tributes jogging in her direction. It was, she noticed, the one that Cress had seemed smitten with on the train. “I’m Thorne, and you are?”

Despite his casual demeanor, Cinder could see intelligence shining behind his vacant expression, and she was sure he already knew her name, along with all the other tributes. She looked over at him with a raised eyebrow, and sighed in annoyance as he sent her a smile with shining teeth. “Linh Cinder.”

He nodded, as if contemplatively. “Ah yes, the dangerous beauty from district three--” she rolled her eyes but he either didn’t see or didn’t care. “--not to be confused with the dangerous beauty from district two, the floaty beauty from district three, or the angry beauty from district nine.”

Cinder groaned as they got on the elevator, pressing the buttons for the first and third floors. “I can’t believe you. We’re walking closer to our deaths every minute and you’re flirting and checking out the ladies.”

He shrugged, both hands raised. “Well if you really think about it, we were always walking closer to our deaths every minute, whether a tribute or not. What better time to flirt?”

She scoffed. He put the back of his hand on his forehead. “Ah, woe is me, I can see you’ve already been claimed.”

The doors to the first floor finally slid open and Cinder basically pushed him out. “Get going Thorne, or I might strangle you prematurely.”

He walked away backwards, still facing the door. “Call me Captain.”

“Captain what?”

He made finger guns, his laughing making his words hard to understand. “Captain of your heart, sweetheart.”

The doors finally slid shut, giving Cinder just enough time to make a face at Thorne. She shook her head. Despite her better judgment, she’d found herself liking the guy. Especially since he’d backed off once she didn’t reciprocate his flirting. Or, maybe he didn’t back off, but his flirting became more clearly for laughs. Dumb district one kid tossing around smiles like this was a vacation and he was here to make friends and keep them.

Chapter Text

Training week was a nightmare, and Cress was glad when it was finally over. It was clearly not geared toward people with talents in technology, and especially not computers. In the past there hadn’t been a single computer in the arena. Coils of wire were the closest they got.

And that was not close at all.

But it was over, and now Cress sat outside the training room, as people entered and showed off for Aimery Park and the other gamemakers. The hall was nearly silent, even filled with tributes. One by one they entered the room, and then some minutes later a trainer would come to get the next tribute. 

When Cress’s turn came, she stood on shaky legs, reminding herself to look confident and not fold in on herself. She didn’t expect to get a good score--she couldn’t really fight--but she could at least do her best to not make a fool of herself.

***

Scarlet had done fairly well in training week, she thought. She already knew how to make a fire and set traps, so she’d spent some time learning about poisonous and edible plants, and then getting used to the feel of each type of weapon in her hand. 

When her turn came to earn her score, Scarlet pulled her usual facade of apathy and anger over her apprehension, and walked in to face the gamemakers. They weren’t really paying attention to her, of course, but instead of yelling to let them know she was there, she started walking around the space. 

Talking just above normal volume, she started picking up things and assessing them. “I was a bit sad not to see any guns here in the training center, but I suppose you’ve never had them in the games before.” Out of the corner of her eye she could see a few game makers turn her way, but not many. “Apparently someone thinks guns are too boring and bloodless for the games?” She shrugged. “Too bad, that’s really my weapon.”

As she talked, Scarlet made a fire, set a snare, and separated edible from poisonous plants. Then for the first time, she looked the gamemakers on directly, standing right behind the fire so it cast dramatic light on her face. “Besides, have you ever seen someone get shot? It’s very dramatic, and hardly bloodless.”

Her passive aggressive rambling had caught their attention, finally, and she reached to the side, picking up a spear. “This will have to do.”

She let it fly at the target.

***

Though she knew she should be focusing on getting sponsors, Cinder didn’t want to show the gamemakers all she could do. When her turn came, she showed them the fires and traps, and a few weapon skills she’d learned during the week, but everything important she kept hidden. If she had a high score, she would be a target.

***

Training was useful, but scores were stupid. What was the point of scoring everyone when the walls were bleeding?

Winter knew, logically, that the walls were fine. But it looked so real.

And it soon would be real.

When her turn came, she quickly stood and skipped into the training room. She ignored the weapons, as she had for the past week. Instead, she grabbed some painting supplies and sat on the ground in the middle of the room. She knew everyone’s eyes were on her, but she ignored them. 

And she would not pick up a weapon. Never again.

She hummed to herself, and then it turned to singing, a nursery rhyme she had stuck in her head. She painted vines on her arms--not realistic ones for camouflage, but artsy ones, serving no other purpose than to look pretty and pass the time until she could leave and let the other tributes come in.

From up in the observation area, Aimery Park spoke. “My dear girl, don’t you have something else to show us? Something we can use to give you a tribute score?”

When he talked, the vines on her arm started to writhe. They snaked their way around her arms. She watched in horror and fascination as they slid upwards, and she felt them close around her neck. She staggered to her feet, trying to tear the vines away, but they wouldn’t budge. 

The world around her seemed shiny, a sure indicator that what she was seeing wasn’t real, but still the vines tightened.

Winter could see the gamemakers above panicking. Of course, none of them had seen her madness yet. She forgot that it wasn’t well known. Stepmother and Co. had tried to keep it hidden. 

Hah. No more. I’ll show them all who I am and what they’ve done to me.

From a side door, her knight rushed in, pulling her into his arms and carrying her away from the man with the shiny voice who made paintings writhe.

Chapter Text

As a tribute, Kai hadn’t liked the interviews very much. As a mentor, they weren’t too bad. He just had to sit there and remember things about the competition so they could develop final strategy points. He didn’t have to do any of the talking this time ‘round. 

His tributes were definitely feeling the pressure, though. In the days after the score testing (which had netted fours for the boys and fives for the girls of district three), they’d gone over interview etiquette and presentation. Every single one of his tributes were more anxious for this than for their score evaluation.

Cress, at least, had seemed to do alright with putting on a front and pretending to know what she was doing. When he’d suggested she play the angle of cute and innocent and too good for the games, she’d closed her eyes and taken some deep breaths, and then opened them with a wide doe-eyed look. “Mister Caesar, sir, I’m so glad to meet you and see all the wonders of the Capitol! I just wish I could stay in this splendor my whole life.”

Kai had almost fist pumped in triumph, and for the rest of the time they’d practiced things like walking in heels.

Chang Sunto was going for a similar angle to Cress, and though he wasn’t as naturally good at selling it, his age, and position as the youngest one in the games this year, were enough. And as much as Kai had tried (Sybil Mira hadn’t tried to mentor at all), the other boy wouldn’t come out of his room. He’d show up for mandatory training and interviews, but refused to accept help from his mentors.

Other than that, the biggest problem had been Cinder.

They’d sat down in the dining room a few days ago, and he’d asked her if she had any ideas for the interview. She’d thought for a minute, metal fingers tangled in her bangs, and then sat back with a huff of breath, arms folded across her chest, legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. “I got nothing.”

Kai had mimicked her position and stared her down. She seemed a little uncomfortable with the scrutiny, shifting in her seat, but didn’t look away. He’d finally leaned forward. “I know your score doesn’t reflect it, but you could go for the dangerous and deadly angle. You’ve been doing more in training than anyone realizes.”

He was actually really honored she’d told him about her secret efforts during the last week to become the most dangerous survivalist and accidental experimental archaeologist out there.

She shook her head. “No, for the same reason I didn’t show off in my testing. I don’t want to be a target.”

“Well, how about cute and sweet, like Cress? We could have a district theme.”

After a very brief attempt, they’d both decided that didn’t work.

He’d watched as she paced back and forth. She really did look deadly with that look of concentration, lithe and strong. “Hm.”

She stopped and looked at him. “What?”

He stood up so they were at the same eye level. “Our angle could be to make the entire Capitol fall in love with you.”

“Oh yeah, right,” she snorted, a small blush on her cheeks. “Because everyone thinks complex wiring in a girl is a turn-on.”

She rolled her eyes.

Okay sure, maybe the Capitol wouldn’t think she was beautiful, full of bigots as it was, but he sure did. Complex wiring and all.

He hadn’t said anything, but as she looked back at him her blush deepened. She stuttered a bit. “You--what--” She shook her head. “We’re not taking that angle! It won’t work, and I don’t want the entire Capitol in love with me anyway.”

She had slumped into her chair, one arm over the back, and grabbed a dinner roll from the table, shoving half of it in her mouth and chewing angrily.

Yep. That was his girl.

On stage, the interviews were starting, Caesar Flickerman making the most out of each one. In the seat next to Kai, Konn Torin actually had a notepad out. He wasn’t a mentor this year--hadn’t been since Kai’s games--but he still liked to support the tributes and learn what he could.

District one was the same as every year. The only one Kai could separate out was the last boy, a certain Carswell Thorne. He’d walked on stage with a swagger, and joked with Caesar about pretty girls.

“So, young man, is there anyone special back home?”

“No, no, I’m trying to cut back on my serious relationships, y’see? They haven’t gone very well for me. I have done some flirting with the other tributes, but none of them seem to reciprocate.” He made a sad face at the audience, who awww-ed in sympathy. 

Caesar placed a hand on his arm. “Not a one?”

Thorne laughed. “Nope, though it might have made me a friend, since Cinder almost tossed me down an elevator shaft, and I think that’s her method of showing she cares.”

The audience laughed.

Kai didn’t like him.

From district two, Winter was the second interview. Kai had heard rumors that for several years now she’d been struggling with her sanity, and that seemed to be on display tonight. She kept looking off into space on either side of Caesar or over the audience, though when he looked closer, Kai could see a glint of mischief, and he wondered if this time, she was messing with them on purpose. 

She talked about what she’d miss from the Capitol and her home in two: sour apple petite candies, a solar system model she painted with her best friend, and the white wolf at the zoo. She’d said his name was Ryu, and then she stuck her nose in the air and howled daintily.

Uncertain of what to do, Caesar thanked her and ushered her off stage, to the confused claps and cheers of the audience, who also seemed thrown off balance by the girl.

Following her onto stage was a tall blonde boy, probably Kai’s age, who sat down on the edge of the chair and glared at Caesar. When asked about both how he volunteered and his high training score (a ten), he answered the same. “I’m here to protect Winter.”

He never elaborated.

Then it was district three’s turn. Cress performed admirably, wearing a floaty yellow dress patterned like a butterfly. She even used the exact line she had in practice, causing the entire audience to coo, and Caesar to wipe away a fake tear.

“So why don’t you tell us a little about yourself, yes? You grew up in three, what did you do there?”

She ducked her head. “I was actually raised by Sybil Mira, the victor. I helped her run her computer systems.”

Kai snorted, and was shushed by Konn Torin. Helped run the computer systems. Cress was probably the greatest hacker in Panem.

When Cress’s interview was over, Caesar Flickerman announced Cinder. Kai straightened up. They’d finally decided that she should just be herself for the interview, but who knew how that would go.

Cinder actually stumbled out onto stage, clearly having been pushed. The gasp from the audience didn’t seem to phase her, as she didn’t seem to notice the hand Caesar held out to help her, but straightened up by herself and made a face back at the curtain she had come through. As she straightened up, her outfit was put on full display, and Kai suddenly found it a little hard to breathe. She was wearing, basically, a pantsuit, but it was perfectly tailored, and the red color looked amazing on her. 

She flopped down into her seat, like Kai was used to seeing, and pulled off her suit jacket, which she had probably been told not to do. But hey, he had told her to be herself, right?

Caesar settled back in his seat. “Are you alright, my dear?”

She smiled wryly. “Oh, I'm fine.” She started speaking pointedly at the backstage area. “It’s just that someone put me in heels and then pushed me onstage, when I’ve never worn a shoe higher than an inch in my life.”

She crossed her legs, showing off the strappy sandals with a four or five inch heel.

The audience laughed, and the big screens showed Iko peeking through the curtain and making a face right back at Cinder.

With all the skill of a master MC, Caesar brought the house down, and leaned forward to look at Cinder more directly. “The girl you volunteered for.”

Cinder crossed her arms and sunk into her seat. “My sister.”

“Couldn’t let her take all the fame and glory.”

Massive miscalculation on Caesar’s part , Kai thought. Anger broadcast on Cinder’s face, easily readable. Caesar quickly sat back. Cinder looked out at the audience, and caught Kai’s gaze, taking a few deep breaths so the anger was simmering under the surface rather than boiling over the top. “I couldn’t care less for fame and glory. I volunteered because Peony is much too kind a person to end up in the games. From as early as I can remember, she was my only friend, and the only person who brought light and good to my life.”

She skewered Caesar with her gaze again. “So no, I didn’t do this to claim prestige.”

After a little bit of backpedaling, the gregarious host asked one last question. “You said your sister was too kind for the games. Are you?”

Cinder snorted. “I’m a sarcastic sass monster and stubborn as a bad computer connection, what do you think?”

Kai missed her outro because he was laughing.

Chapter Text

Ze’ev Kesley was asleep.

Or at least a close as he could get to sleep without worrying that he’d miss his cue. Last time he’d woken up enough to pay attention to what was happening, the first district five tribute was making her way onto the stage, shaking like a newborn foal.

He settled his head against the wall and crossed his arms, dropping quickly into a doze.

The dream came again, without warning.

The wide open fields were torn by wind, but Ze’ev sat on the fence post with the gale at his back, the endless sky ahead, craggy rocks in the distance. Used to the weather, the sheep he was protecting simply tucked their heads and huddled together.

Ze’ev was content.

Except the wind quickly blew dark clouds overhead. He was yanked off the fence by an unknown force, shoved to the ground. As he watched, his hands grew talons, and he could feel his canines growing into sharp fangs. His vision sharpened, focusing on the sheep. Yet now he was the predator, his instincts calling out, telling him to charge, to chase, to rip, to sate.

Lightning hit the rocks in the distance, and there was a crack of thunder. Ze’ev snarled at his prey, and then threw back his head and howled.

Breath uneven, he jerked away from the wall. The hall was almost empty, only fifteen of the tributes remaining there. No one was paying attention as he woke from his nightmare, except his younger brother, Ran, who was watching him with that same sneer.

The nightmare always started the same. He watched the animals back in district 10, happy, with no worries. And then everything dissolved into chaos. When he awoke, Ze’ev always felt the bloodlust from the dream lingering, but he always shook it off with disgust. 

He was sure if Ran suffered from that nightmare, he wouldn’t see it as horrible at all.

Cheers and clapping announced the end of another interview. The next tribute stood up to go on stage, and Ze’ev’s eyes snapped to her. It was the girl from the chariots, who’d seen him nearly kill his brother.

Scarlet.

She caught his gaze again, and there was something soulful in her eyes that he was drawn to. They hadn’t spoken during training week, but he’d always been aware of her position in the room, a flash of red and an aura of determination.

He nodded to her, and she gifted him a small smile, before turning and walking onto the stage. 

Caesar announced her, and then Ze’ev heard her voice for the first time. She was being asked about her family back home. She replied with bluntness, telling about a drunk, absent father, and being raised by her grandmother, who had disappeared a week before the reaping.

Ze’ev ached for her. If that had happened to his mother--

The next question surprised him. He must have missed something while wrapped up in his thoughts. “You seem to be a strong, talented young woman. And you got an eight as a training score, not bad! Are you excited to enter the arena and slay those animals from the other districts?”

The Capitol audience seemed to love the question. They had always taken great pleasure in dehumanizing the tributes, and the citizens of the districts as a whole.

Scarlet’s gaze hardened, and Ze’ev started to get a better idea of Scarlet’s personality, and the fact that Caesar would soon be wishing he’d asked anyone else that question.

“I have not seen a single animal on stage tonight, nor will I. I didn’t see any animals in the tribute parade.”

Silence fell in the audience. She leaned forward in her chair. “Tell me, Mr. Flickerman. Do animals tell jokes, cry for their families, sacrifice themselves for their friends? Does an animal long for glory, manipulate you into feeling for him?”

Though he couldn’t see the audience, Ze’ev could hear the murmur among them, could imagine President Levana beginning to rise from her seat, signaling them to get Scarlet off the stage. 

But she had one more thing left to say, speaking over Caesar as he hurriedly gave her outro. “If we are animals, it is because we have been made so by those leading us to slaughter.”

Ze’ev barely heard the next two interviews. Scarlet’s words sang powerfully in his mind, chasing away the ghost of his nightmare.

He was not an animal. Not a killer, with teeth waiting to tear.

He was a protector. 

And it was this conviction that he carried onto the stage, a great light burning in his chest, not fading even when Caesar referenced his costume from the tribute parade, calling him “the wolf among the sheep” or “the wolf in wolf’s clothing.”

The interview was easier than expected. Only one question threw him. “Your name was called from the reaping before your brother’s. If he’d been called first, would you have volunteered to keep him safe.”

Ze’ev snarled. “There is no love lost between my brother and I, but if this had been a normal year, yes, I would have. I’ve spent my life protecting Ran, and if he lets me, I will continue to.”

Unused to speaking so much, he dipped his head. “Our mother needs one of us, but it doesn’t matter which.”

Ran’s interview was full of smarmy words and sharp smiles. When he came off stage to where the tributes were all waiting, he nearly ripped Ze’ev’s head off, both verbally and physically. “You always have to push me to the bottom, huh? Make me the weak one?” He shoved the taller brother away, where he was caught by a couple of other tributes. “If you try to protect me, make me look weak in the arena, take away my glory, I’ll kill you myself.”

The threat wasn’t empty, Ze’ev knew that much. He didn’t say anything.

Though they were supposed to stay in the hall until all the interviews had been finished, Ran stalked off, slamming his way through a door and disappearing into the maze of the broadcasting station. Ze’ev stood up straight with the help of a few other tributes, nodding to them in thanks. They ignored him.

“Are you alright?”

They’d never spoken, but he knew the voice behind him. He turned to see Scarlet, a hand outstretched. Ze’ev shrugged noncommittally. “Ran has never been able to hurt me without a weapon.”

The look she gave him let him know that wasn’t really a normal sibling relationship, but she didn’t press him on it. “What’s your name? Caesar only called you Wolf.”

“Ze’ev.”

“Scarlet.”

“I know. Your interview gave me courage to speak.”

Her eyes, full of life, stared into his, and she smiled.

Chapter Text

How many tributes, she wondered, had stood here, the night before the games, facing their fate? How many had died the very next day?

Her feet were freezing into blocks of ice. Soon her toes would start breaking off. She could tell.

“Winter, we should go inside, my feet are frozen solid from this wind.”

She looked over at Jacin, standing next to her on the roof of the tribute center, looking over the Capitol. “Oh. So that wasn’t my crazy? It actually is cold?”

He led her inside, rubbing her hands between his. He was so warm.

Rather than take the elevator back down to the second level, they sank to the floor in the stairwell that led down, side by side as they had always been.

Jacin leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and stared off into nothing. Winter stared at him. Her knight.

He turned to look at her. “How has your day been?” He smiled a bit as he continued. “Aside from the interview, which I think you nailed, by the way.”

She had been rather proud of that. But thinking about the rest of the day was just giving her a headache. Things weren’t fitting into place, swimming around. And thinking of the bleeding walls earlier made the walls begin to bleed again. With a sharp breath she grabbed Jacin’s arm. He knew what it meant, and pulled her close until she could make some sort of sense of the world her mind constantly forced her into.

The bleeding didn’t stop. She closed her eyes, but then the inside of her eyelids bled.

It was choking her, cutting off her air, cloying in her throat as it filled up all the space she wouldn’t allow it.

She opened her eyes. Better for the walls of the tribute center to bleed than her. “Aimery Park visited.”

Jacin’s position holding her didn’t change, and she couldn’t feel him tense up, but she could feel his anger radiating. (He was so very good at hiding his emotions from everyone except her.)

“What did he want?”

“What does he ever want?”

Winter had never had to give anything to Gamemaker Park, not yet. Not like so many who’d had so much taken by him. He’d tried, but she’d been more powerful then. And now she was in the eye of the people. She knew that if she got out of the arena though, he’d take her however he wanted, when he wanted. 

She hated him. She’d never hated anyone other than him, but because of him she knew what it was to hate. She knew Jacin hated him too, hated that he hadn’t been there to protect her and that she’d needed protection in the first place, but he could do even less about it than her.

If only she could figure out how to escape the treacherous mindscape Park and his experiments had created, or get to the point where it no longer got worse when Park was around, she might be able to break free of his influence.

Chapter Text

She’d never been curious about the mechanisms of the games before, but now she couldn’t help but look for gears and switches on the lift that would take her into the arena. She was probably trying to distract herself.

After saying goodbye to Kai at dinner last night, he’d knocked on her door a few hours later. She’d padded over in her pajamas, and when she’d opened it he’d immediately pulled her into a hug and started rambling off advice. “Avoid the bloodbath. Grab some gear nearby if you can, but don’t go anywhere near the others. It’s dangerous enough in a normal year.” 

Startled, it had taken Cinder a moment to return the hug. She flung her arms around him and tried not to cry. It was giving her a headache.

The tears fell onto his shoulder anyway.

“While the timer is going, assess your surroundings, both people and place.”

She buried her face in his neck. He was talking faster now, anxious. “Find water. Make yourself a weapon. Don’t forget to watch out for gamemaker traps and mutts as well as the other tributes--”

Cinder pulled back and tried to catch his gaze. “Kai, you’re going to start hyperventilating.”

He stopped talking and focused on breathing for a moment. His eyes roamed her face, He pushed a loose hair back into place as he took her hand. “I want to see you again, and not just on some screen. Not hurt or left for dead. Come back.”

With a small movement he leaned forward to kiss her cheek.

Then he was gone.

And now she stood underneath the arena, Iko checking her clothes, same as all the other tributes.

Her best friend gave her a hug. “I love you Cinder.”

“I love you Iko. Don’t forget me, huh?”

“I never could.”

And then Iko was gone too, off to help the other tributes from District 3 prepare. Cinder was locked in the glass tube, waiting to be raised upward into the arena.

Everything seemed to be moving too fast. She could feel her heart beating out of her chest. Before she was ready (how could she--anyone--ever be ready) the lift activated, and she was raised first into the darkness of the tunnel and then into the blinding light of the arena.

The countdown. That was the first thing she noticed. Before her eyes adjusted she could hear it. The steady beats.

The tributes. There were so many. 

The sun was directly over them all, hanging over the cornucopia, which absorbed the light into its dark, matte surface, rather than reflecting it.

Her heart was still pounding, but she knew she had to take the time she was given.

There were forty-five seconds left on the clock.

In the distance she could see tall, snow capped mountains, and far in the other direction might be dust and red rock. In the immediate area were two types of terrain, scrub grass, where the cornucopia was located, and maybe a quarter mile away was the beginnings of a forest.

Twenty-four seconds.

She couldn’t immediately see any water sources, but there had to be at least one, right?

Twenty seconds.

Inside the cornucopia, Cinder could see all sorts of weapons. She ignored them. The crates of food were harder to dismiss, but she turned away.

There was very little in the way of supplies closer to the tributes. They wanted as many of them to head to the cornucopia as possible. She wouldn’t.

Ten.

She looked at the tributes on either side of her, paying attention to where they were looking. One was clearly heading straight in toward the weapons. The other seemed to be looking at the ground about halfway in between.

Five.

Cinder scanned the ground once more.

Two-one-go.

Everything was happening at once. Cinder lept off her platform and ran to the tiny pack she had picked, only ten meters from her. She could hear shouts and thuds and the swinging of weapons as the bloodbath started in earnest.

The forest was far enough away. She didn’t need to waste more time.

Just a little bit further was another supply pack.

She grabbed it as well, an arrow whizzing past her face as she crouched down. 

It struck another tribute.

Now she ran. Like she never had before. She’d never had the need to run like this.

Weaving back and forth, stumbling, falling, scrambling back up. She almost ran full on into another tribute, but turned a different direction. 

The trees were closer now.

Pain.

Her feet were taking her further away, but her senses had all blacked out, letting the agony consume her.

Barely breathing.

Not because she was dying, not yet.

Trees loomed in her vision, leafy and evergreen all mixed together, packed close in the space, and she ran until she couldn’t anymore.

The pain had become commonplace. She hardly noticed it. But her energy was sapped.

Under the trees it was shadowed, and Cinder dragged herself a few more meters, under the low branches of a pine. Leaning against the trunk, she finally took inventory. Pack with water bottle and water purification tablets. Arrow sticking through her side, one inch from the edge, bloody metal head gleaming in the low light. Pack with three bags of dried fruit and nuts.

She should probably take care of that.

Slowly, still feeling her heart beating its martial tattoo, she tore the straps from the packs, and the sleeves from her shirt. The pain was still dull, so she broke the arrow in two, preparing to pull it out.

The pain washed over her again, as strong as before, and she barely had time to haltingly place her bandages and tie them in place before passing out.

Chapter Text

Scarlet hadn’t wanted to go to the forest. She was sure that’s where all the other tributes had gone to escape the bloodbath. But here she was, looking down from among the branches, watching for other tributes as the morning broke.

The first day after the bloodbath was usually pretty tame in the games she’d watched in the past--the gamemakers and announcers were busy assessing who’d died on the first day, and the career pack that usually stayed at the cornucopia was planning and taking inventory of their materials and skills. A good night to get sleep, and assess her own inventory the next morning.

She was just wrapping her rope back up and checking the sharpness on her spear when she heard the faintest whisper of sound from the ground beneath her. Her attention immediately snapped to the noise, and she watched as a figure moved through the bushes. She couldn’t identify him yet, but she could tell he was large. And quiet. Very quiet.

Her grip on the tree tightened in her nervousness, and the bark cracked. It was barely audible at all, but the man must have been paying very close attention, because he paused, and then headed in her direction.

At last he came around a tree and she could see his face. And he was looking up at her. 

It was one of the boys from District 10, Ze’ev.

Immediately, her instinct was to smile and greet him. They hadn’t talked much during the past weeks of preparation, but she had felt that he was a good man, a man to trust.

But the reality of the games was that no one could be trusted. So she lifted the spear, ready to throw if necessary. He raised his hands in a placating gesture, showing that he wasn’t armed (or at least wasn’t carrying the weapon at that moment), but kept moving toward the base of the tree until they could easily speak without their voices carrying.

The whole time he approached he stayed within sight, within easy aim if she was to throw her spear.

Scarlet glared at him. “What do you want?”

His voice was soft but clear. “I figure this will be easier if we team up. We’d be able to watch each other’s backs, combine our skills.”

“How do I know you wouldn’t stab me in the back instead?”

Still looking up from the ground beneath her, Ze’ev smiled, a little scary and a little mischievous. “Technically you don’t, but you could have easily killed me by now. I think we’ve gotten past that point.”

She lowered her spear and considered for a second. Slinging her pack over her shoulders, she swung down the trunk of the tree and dropped to the ground in front of him. Leaning against her spear, she raised an eyebrow at him. “Very convincing speech. If that’s how you get allies, it’s no wonder you’re standing here alone.”

“I didn’t want any other allies.” He stuck out his hand. “Good to see you again, Scarlet. Glad you made it past the bloodbath.”

“You as well.”

After a brief discussion they set out in search of water, following the sound of birds. It was possible there was only underground water, or all the moisture came from rain, but they might as well look. In what Scarlet took as another symbol of trust, Ze’ev walked in front of her. If she wanted to kill him, she easily could. Even with the knives in his pack and on his belt, he wouldn’t be able to reach them in time if she attacked. She was sure the Capitol audience was screaming for her to do just that, but she didn’t want to. She didn’t want to kill anyone, and she definitely didn’t want to kill him, who was both strong and fearsome, but sincere and kind as well.

The night sky had shown yesterday’s fallen tributes. Twenty-three of them. There were twenty-five people still in this hell-pit, and things hadn’t really even started yet.

Noon came and went with no sign of water, but when the sun was halfway down in the sky they heard the sound of a stream. Scarlet started running, feeling faint from twenty four hours without drink, but Ze’ev grabbed her arm and held her back, ignoring her angry look. “There’s bound to be someone else at the stream. Water is scarce enough here for that. We have to approach carefully.”

He was right, of course, and Scarlet sighed. “Right. Sneak in, check if there’s someone else there. We should probably also take turns standing lookout for the same reason.”

And it was a good thing they did. As Scarlet took her turn filling water bottles, the sound of a fight broke out behind her. Ze’ev shouted in alarm, and she turned to see Ran Kesley, his brother, on his back, choking him. A knife that she didn’t recognize as one of her ally’s was laying on the rock, knocked to the side. She stood up and grabbed her spear, but before she could get a clean shot, Ze’ev had slipped the chokehold and tossed his brother to the rocks of the riverbed. Ran’s head cracked against the stone, and he looked disoriented as Ze’ev started to choke him back, his full and considerable weight pressing down his hands against the windpipe of the smaller boy.

And Scarlet could see why they called him the Wolf. There was an anger in his eyes, darkening his vision. When she called out for him to stop he didn’t hear her.

Instead, she left a shallow cut on his arm with her spear. He jerked back, turning his fury on her, and for a moment she was terrified, reeling back, before he calmed. She held out a hand hesitantly and touched the cut. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to kill your brother. I didn’t want your mother to have to watch that.”

Ze’ev took a deep breath and let it out. “Thank you. Let’s grab the water and leave this scum behind.”

He moved past her toward the river, and behind him Scarlet could see Ran reaching out for the knife he’d dropped earlier. Raising unsteadily to his feet, he let out a cry of rage and leaped, at her or his brother she couldn’t tell.

But her spear had a longer reach.

Chapter Text

She couldn’t tell if she’d moved in the time since she passed out. She could tell she hadn’t been killed, since her side still hurt like nothing else. The sun was high above her in the sky. She could see it through the tree branches as she cracked open her eyelids.

“Oh hey, you’re awake!”

As fast as her wound would allow, Cinder turned to face the voice, wishing she had a better weapon than half an arrow. Kneeling by her open bags (she had not left them open last night, even though she was injured) was one of the boys from district one, the one she’d talked to in the tribute center. She pushed herself up with a grunt of pain, and gave him an incredulous look. “ Thorne ? Really? Are you stealing from my supplies?”

He reached out and slowly zipped back up the bags. “Well yes, that was the plan, but now that you’re awake that would be quite rude.”

“Not to complain, but why didn’t you just kill me? And why do you need supplies in the first place? You’re a shoo-in for the career pack, couldn’t you just get stuff from the cornucopia?”

Taking a pack of food from his pocket ( her food, that he stole ), he tore it open and started to munch on the contents. “Yeah, you’d think, huh? But the career pack isn’t really a thing this year, believe it or not. District 2 broke off to form their own little base, and District 1 scattered to the wind when 4, 7, and 11 took the cornucopia. So here I am, with no supplies and no allies, waiting for death.”

Thorne sighed sadly, and then popped another almond in his mouth. “Besides, I just realized there’s no soap in this whole arena.”

Cinder held out her hand. “Give me the trail mix, Thorne.”

He took one last M&M before handing it over. “Well, I suppose because you’re injured.”

She ate a handful of the nuts and raisins before scooting over and placing it back in her bag. “Well, we’d better get somewhere more safe and come up with a plan to get more supplies.”

  “We?”

She gave him an annoyed look. “Neither of us has a weapon to kill each other with, and if I leave you to your own devices you’ll clearly die within the day, so as much as you irritate me, we’re stuck together for the time being.”

He hopped to his feet and grabbed the bags. “Excellent! I’ll carry our stuff, and you can look out for danger.”

“ My stuff. Not our stuff.”

“You’ll come to love me eventually, just you wait.”

Before she stood up, holding onto a tree for support, Cinder searched the ground until she found what might just end up saving her life, if she was given a chance to use it--the broken arrow, still covered in her blood. Without a knife she wouldn’t be able to make any of the tools she’d practiced, but with this? She might just get by.

Thorne started walking, checking back to see if she was following and keeping up. She had no idea which direction was which, given her disorientation from the day before, but Thorne seemed to have at least some idea. An idea which she discounted when he led her out of the forest and into the sagebrush area.

“Hey Cadet--” “Captain!” “Don’t we want to stay where we’ve got shelter and hiding places?”

He was skirting around the cornucopia area where the New Careers were hanging out, but she still wasn’t sure. “Trust me. I figure that most of the tributes will have headed right for the forest or mountains, so this should be more empty, and we’ll be careful. And we need water, right? I found a lake over this way last night.”

Cinder looked at him in silence for long enough that he started to look nervous. “What? What did I say?”

She chuckled at his discomfort. “Nothing, it’s a good plan. I just didn’t expect common sense from you, is all.”

“Oh ha ha.”

The tribute outfits they were given didn’t really blend into the environment here, too dark for the dusty ground and dusty green plants, which caused no small amount of panic for Cinder when a tribute ran past in the distance and Cinder and Thorne had to try and hide until the figure had disappeared.

Overall they made it to the lake without incident, though. Some of the lake was surrounded by scraggly trees or shale shores, but the area they approached was filled with tall grasses and reeds. Cinder took out the water bottle and filled it, dropping in a water purification tablet. Thorne stuck his face in the river and drank, ignoring her warnings about getting sick from the unclean water. Clearly he’d never had giardia before, or he’d be more careful. Coddled District 1 kids.

Cinder watched the area around her as she waited for the water to purify, walking over to the shale shore. Unlike she would have expected from river rocks, the stones weren’t round, but flat, like they’d just been blown out of a slate mine. She crouched and picked up a stone, testing the edge on her arm. It wasn’t sharp enough to shave hair off her arm, like a good knife was, but it would definitely draw blood if she pressed at all.

She could work with that.

The water had finished purifying, and Cinder drank half of the bottle, cleaning her wound with the other half, before refilling it and setting it to purify with another tablet. Using one of the sharp stones, and then trimming the ends with the now clean arrow, Cinder cut a length of hollow reed and stuck it in her belt. If she could find something to use as projectiles, she now had a blow gun.

Thorne looked at her curiously as she broke one of the branches off a short nearby tree, and split a section near the end of the two foot piece using the sharp rock. And then sitting down on the banks of the river again, this time hidden among the reeds, Cinder took the more leaf-like tops of the reeds and started scraping them down, preparing the long process of twisting rope. If she wanted an axe, she’d have to work for it. At least she didn’t have to sharpen her own stone.

That made her smile. The game makers had probably intended the sharp stones to be a hazard when people were fighting, but she was going to use it to her advantage.

Chapter Text

It had been two days since Cress stepped off the platform and ran for the hills. And she was really regretting choosing the location she did.

Logically it made sense. No other tributes were going to go for the desert and red rock terrain if there was forest and mountains. Also logically, however, a logic that she hadn’t considered: it was a lot harder to survive in the desert than the forest.

The past two days the only water she’d had was morning dew she’d collected, which was practically nothing. There was no river or water-filled cave system, and she received nothing from sponsors. 

She was sure that death was waiting for her before the day was out. Few cannons had sounded since the bloodbath, and the Capitol was no doubt chomping at the bit for some action. But they’d probably let her die first, just so they could keep telling tributes in later years that “exposure kills as easily as a knife.”

After collecting as much water as she could that morning, Cress lay back down in her cave, watching as a tiny lizard scurried across the opening. Even the sun loving reptiles weren’t out in the heat of the southern arena. The sun rose so slowly it was as if there was a giant that lifted it into the sky, struggling as the weight pushed him down.

Cress heard a sound outside her hideaway and tried to focus her delirious mind. It sounded as if there were two people approaching. Though it was a struggle to rise, her vision tunneling and head spinning from dehydration, she shifted closer to the mouth of the cave, carefully staying in the anonymity of the shadows. I’m a ninja, a predator, stalking my prey, ready to pounce. Ha. As if she could attack someone with any degree of success.

The two invaders on her territory rounded a corner, and now she could not only see who it was, but hear their conversation.

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad we have weapons and all, but you couldn’t make a sword or something?”

It was Thorne, swooshing a primitive looking axe through the air, with a rough wooden handle and a dark grey axe-head. Next to him walked Cinder. She looked kind of strange, actually. She was wearing the same thing the other tributes were, of course, but with one sleeve torn off, and some wide straps tying it to a wound in her side. Sticking out of her belt were several sticks of different shapes, including a reed, a stick with a hooked end, and an axe similar to the one Thorne was swinging. Hanging from her hands and tied to her belt was a length of string, and her pockets were bulging with rocks. “Just be happy you have a weapon at all. You couldn’t have grabbed anything when you escaped the Cornucopia?”

He pointedly ignored her and kept swooshing the axe, getting a feel for it. Cinder ducked as it got a little too close. “And watch it, or I’ll keep this bola I’m making for myself.”

Cress was faced with a decision as they came closer to her hiding spot. Out of the people in the arena, Cinder was the one she trusted the most, and Thorne was the one she wanted to trust. But the Games changed people, and despite the primitive nature of the weapons, both tributes were very heavily armed.

Was it worth the risk of allying herself with them on the chance she could get supplies, specifically food and water?

She was distracted by a loud crack of thunder and a sudden downpour of rain. All thoughts of safety gone, she scrambled out of her hiding place and cupped her hands to catch the rain, refreshing and clean, settling the dust that choked the air. She only wished she had some way to catch the rain and store it.

As she stood, face turned to the sky, the rain got even heavier. It started to hurt her face, and rivulets of water ran by on the ground. The thunder clashed again, and now she could hear rushing water as well.

There wasn’t a river nearby, so why could she hear one?

Over the noise she could hear yelling, and realized that it was Thorne and Cinder yelling for her. They’d moved to the side of the gorge they were all in and were waving her over. She headed in their direction, and as she did, realized where the sound of a river was coming from.

The rain wasn’t natural. Of course it wasn’t. The Capitol needed to up the action, and the three of them were meant to be the next victims of the games.

Thorne confirmed her thoughts when she reached them, all trying to climb as high as they could on the rocks.

“It’s a flash flood. We get them in district one. Usually there’s no one in the area in between towns where they happen but we’re still told to be wary of them. Rain in the desert is as dangerous as it is helpful.”

He’d shoved his axe through his belt and held out a hand to help Cress onto the boulder. “Hey blondie, I’m gonna try to lift you higher, since you’re shorter and the water will sweep you away first. That alright?”

She nodded, the situation overcoming her shyness of the cute boy, even as he put his hands on her waist and lifted her up to stand on his shoulders.

Cinder was searching for hand holds up the side of the gorge, but seemed to be finding nothing. She shouted at the other two, over the sound of the torrential rushing waters. “It’s good to see you, Cress! I’m glad you’re still alive! Any ideas to get us out of here?”

There were no hand holds on the rock wall higher up either, where she could reach from her perch on Thorne’s shoulders. This flood must have been planned, because there was no easy way to get out by climbing. And the rope made out of reeds that Cinder had been making was much to thin to support even Cress’s weight, and she was the lightest among them.

The waters rose higher. They were now over the top of the boulder, tearing at the foundation their feet stood on.

The boulder shifted. Cress waved a hand over to Cinder. “Climb up the two of us, you should be able to get to the top of the gorge. And once you’re up there, see if you can’t find something to help us too!”

Cinder looked like she wanted to protest. They were in a desert. Cress knew the chances of finding something to help her and Thorne out were slim. So did Cinder, and she didn’t want to leave them behind. 

But it was the best chance they had.

The boulder wobbled again as Cinder scrambled her way to Thorne’s shoulders and then Cress’s, where she could grip the lip of the gorge and pull herself up with the enhanced strength of her metal left arm. “Wait there! I’m gonna find something to help you up!”

Thorne was now up to his thighs in the water, clinging to the wall for what little support he could get. Cress shifted so she was sitting on his shoulders instead of standing to give him more stability.

The rain felt like getting hit by a souped up pellet gun, and was still getting stronger.

Cress tried to hold onto the wall for support as well “I trust Cinder to get us out of here!” she shouted over the downpour.

She could barely hear Thorne shout back. “I do too!”

And then the water washed the boulder out from under them.

Terror had been a foreign concept before this point. 

Tossed from relative safety into the lion’s mouth, water closing over her. Unable to swim towards the surface, and not knowing where the surface was. Knowing that her chances of surviving a flood like this--one that tore boulders that weighed tons from the ground and uprooted the vegetation that had grown desert deep roots--were almost none.

Inexplicably she found herself wondering where the flash flood led. Was there a lake? Or would her body end up in a giant puddle of water that spread out over the desert once the gorge let out into the open plains? Where would the hovercraft come to pick up her body? Thorne’s body?

Thorne. He was in this nightmare too. 

She fought with the water and with the last vestiges of air in her lungs until she surfaced. He was nowhere to be seen. “Thorne!?”

Suddenly, he surfaced a few yards from her. He looked around, panicked, and then swam in her direction. He had to practically yell in her ear to be heard. “We need to find a new place to stand and wait this out! We’ll get pulled under again if we don’t!”

He maneuvered her so she was clinging to his neck, piggyback, and tried to swim for the edge again.

It was futile. Hopeless.

Cress was crying.

Thorne was swearing, and shaking. 

He was looking over his shoulder when it happened. Cress could see his eyes widen, and then he yelled for her to look out, shoving her off his back and out of the way as a tree trunk swung through the water and smashed into his head.

He dropped under the surface, and Cress screamed.

Chapter Text

It had been a week since he’d found Scarlet in the tree. A week since his brother’s death. A week since she’d saved him from that guilty blood on his hands.

Not that he hadn’t killed before or after that. It had been quite the week.

The cannons had sounded five times since the blood bath. One had been Ran. Two had been during a heavy rainfall a few nights ago. One they’d heard this morning before the artificial sun rose. The last of the five cannons lay at his feet.

Ze’ev hadn’t killed anyone since the cornucopia. He stood, staring into the blank, lifeless eyes of the District 1 girl who’d tried to gut him, jumping out from the bushes on the mountain trail. It had been instinct. He’d dodged her machete, pulling a knife from his belt and stabbing it into her throat before he could think.

Killing a fifteen year old had been instinct.

Fingers snapped in front of his face. He started, and looked up at Scarlet. She looked sympathetic-- empathetic . She had spent the day after killing his brother with shaking hands and haunted eyes. She knew the guilt he was feeling.

But they had to move.

She tugged on the sleeve of his jacket, and he respectfully stepped around the body of the girl. The hovercraft would come to get her soon. And any other tributes in the area would be looking for them now. A cannon could mean a fight, and a fight meant injured tributes, easy pickings, one step closer to being the victor.

They headed into the mountains, hoping for a cave for shelter. The sky looked ready to downpour again, and if the last one was any indication, it was a gamemakers trick.

Ze’ev had wondered why the gamemakers hadn’t sent more mutts or natural disasters after him and Scarlet. They weren’t prime candidates for being victors, so they didn’t have to stay alive for some eventual showdown. He’d figured it out a few days ago. Scarlet had kissed him on the cheek when he’d caught a squirrel in a snare for dinner. He smiled back. She’d blushed. Ten minutes later they’d gotten their first sponsor gift.

They both knew why it had appeared. They weren’t idiots. That night they’d shared a sleeping bag under a tree for warmth, splitting the hearty bread roll that had floated down from the sky under a silver parachute. And they talked. Decided that even if it got them gifts, they didn’t want to be exhibitionists for the Capitol cameras. She pointed out that that meant they would die without being together. They agreed it was better that way. Better to deprive the Capitol of their sick entertainment. Even if it meant that he could do no more than hold her close for warmth during the night and send glances rich with longing and meaning in her direction.

The clouds broke before they found a cave. Moving into the mountains proved to be a mistake, as they were faced with a blizzard of snow, rather than rain. Hoods up, Ze’ev and Scarlet hugged the wall of the mountain pass and tucked their hands, stinging with cold, inside their pockets.

Finally they stumbled on a cave entrance. It was basically a miracle, as they could barely see ten feet in front of them, but they wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth when another hour stuck in the snow would cause hypothermia. 

They rushed inside, only to find the dry back of the cave already occupied by a group of tributes. The groups of teens stared at each other, forced to be enemies by necessity, unable to do anything else. Hand crept toward weapons.

In a rush of movement, the other tributes attacked, swords flashing in the low light, shadows thrown by a tiny fire dancing across the walls. Ze’ev ducked the first swipe and blocked the second, as another tribute attacked Scarlet, trying to get within the reach of her six foot spear. They stumbled backwards, out of the cave, forced backwards by superior numbers. Three tributes from District Four, and two from district seven their numbers on their sleeves. Ze’ev was a good fighter, big and strong, and he knew Scarlet was tenacious enough to be dangerous, but against five opponents? They barely stood a chance. Especially with just knives and a spear.

The blizzard raged around them, snow kicked up from the ground joining the fray, stinging his eyes. He managed to get in a slash on an opponent’s sword hand, and the boy dropped his weapon into the snow, turning to run. Ze’ev went to follow, but heard a cry of pain behind him. It was Scarlet’s voice, he knew it. He spun around, and watched her spear drop to the ground. A sword had hit her hand on the shaft, and blood dripped to the ground, the only bright thing in this world of grey and white. He grabbed the dropped sword, knife in his off hand, and went to help.

He never got the chance. A knife spun out of the hand of one of the district four tributes and hit her in the shoulder. More blood spattered around her feet. She stumbled back. 

And then she was gone.

The knife thrower followed after her. Ze’ev could see him look down. And down. And then carefully step back. “No way she survived that fall. She’ll be dead soon from the cold even if she did.”

Everything was white and red, pain and anger. A roar of grief and distress tore itself from his throat. The red grew, the white all around him, as he ran forward, swinging his sword in deadly arcs. They’d all pay. No one would survive. He was the protector, and if he couldn’t protect? He’d avenge.

The cold finally brought him to himself. He’d been kneeling among the bodies of the dead for several minutes. The blizzard was still raging, but the red now soaked the ground. Not the red he loved so much, the red of his leading star. A darker, more violent red. The red of the sheep he killed in his dream. The red of a massacre. Four cannons sounded. 

By the time he found his way to the bottom of the cliff, Scarlet was gone, either buried under the snow or crawled elsewhere, he didn’t know. But no cannon had sounded for her, and he would make this right.

Chapter Text

It was the rain that woke him. They didn’t get much rain in district two. It ran down his neck and inside his shirt. He opened his eyes to see puddles on the ground in the dawn light, blinking away water as his face turned skyward.

He was leaning against a tree. Which was odd. Why wasn’t he in his sleeping bag? As he moved the back of his head throbbed. They must have been attacked, and he was knocked unconscious.

Kinney walked into his field of view. He looked fine, no injuries. When he saw that Jacin was awake, he called over Fateen. “How are you feeling? Is your head alright?”

Fateen wasn’t injured either. No bandages, no limp.

Maybe they hadn’t been in a fight? But that didn’t explain why he was injured.

And the most important question. 

“Where is Winter?”

The other two tributes from his district looked at each other, and then back at him. “We’ve got to talk to you about her,” Fateen said calmly.

Jacin tensed up. “What does that mean? Is she dead?”

They helped him to his feet and walked him over to a log so he wasn’t sitting on the ground any more. A granola bar and a tin of water were shoved into his hands, but he ignored them. He just wanted to know if she was all right.

After sharing another look, Fateen turned to him and said bluntly, “We left her behind.”

He dropped the food. “You did what? ”

Kinney took over explaining. They’d grown up together, so he probably figured Jacin was more likely to listen to him, to understand. He was wrong.

“She won’t use a weapon. She’s a liability. Last time we got in a fight we spent the whole time protecting her and weren’t able to take out any other tributes. We won’t kill her though, since we don’t want to make enemies back home. So we knocked you out when you were sleeping and snuck away.”

If they hadn’t taken his sword…

He forced himself to stay calm, to breathe, to keep his face blank, as he’d been doing his whole life in peacekeeper training. If he wanted to be able to find Winter and help her again, he needed to not get killed right away by proving himself unhelpful or unstable. His voice bland, he asked, “Why didn’t you leave me with her?” 

Fateen shrugged. “We needed your help. It’s a lot harder to get the drop on three people than it is on two. Bringing you along increased our chance of survival significantly. And we figured that even with how … attached… you are to each other, you’re a logical guy, and will see that it makes sense.

Jacin nodded, but inside he was seething. He was here for Winter. That’s all. He couldn’t care less about the other people in the arena. As long as she got out safely, it was a victory, even though he couldn’t be with her.

For the rest of the day the other two planned to hunt down some of the remaining tributes, even giving him his sword back eventually.

He had plans of his own. The first chance he got he would start looking for her. She had to be alright.

Chapter Text

She knew that people thought she was dumb, just because her brain sometimes didn’t work the way everyone else’s did. But she wasn’t. She wasn’t an idiot. She knew they would leave her behind, that Jacin wouldn’t be given a choice. So when she saw the district two camp had upped and moved without her in the night, and there were heel marks were Jacin had been dragged away, she calmly packed up her sleeping bag (at least they’d gotten some good supplies from the cornucopia before the normal order of the games flipped itself on its head), ate the rest of the squirrel they had cooked last night, and walked in a direction almost at random.

Winter wasn’t planning on surviving this arena. Not that she wanted to die, but she was realistic about her chances, even if she decided to take up a weapon again--which she wouldn’t, not after--

Peacekeepers, backing her into a corner. Drawing the sword she’d practiced with since she could hold a stick. Aimery Park standing behind them, waiting for them to subdue her, hold her down. Slicing, slashing, cutting them down. All except Aimery Park, who for the first time looked at her with fear. Being shunned by a friend for killing her mother, who had only attacked Winter to keep Park from killing her family. Heading to the quarry, where she hadn’t set foot since the second marriage of her father. Stepping over diamond wire and around cranes until she reached the jet-burner channels, jamming the sword into place above a charge, and then walking back to her room in the Hall of Justice, promising never again.

The hard packed earth had turned to mud, then snow, but Winter walked on, eyes squeezed shut. Her arms raised to protect her head from the trees, which sent razor sharp leaves spinning in her direction. They were shiny, so she knew they weren’t a Gamemaker creation. They were a creation of her mind. She could tell the difference now. But they still hurt, leaving cuts behind everywhere but her face.

Four cannon blasts sounded, one after the other, and Winter looked up. The razor leaves were gone, and snow flurried around her. She stood at the base of a cliff in knee deep snow, a body in a pool of red in front of her.

The body groaned, and Winter jumped in surprise.

Then lifted the girl over her shoulder and carried her away from the cliff and whatever fight had just injured her so seriously and killed four others.

***

Strong she was, having grown up in a career district, but even she couldn’t carry someone for too long. So Winter found a cave (not the first one she came across, that one had been full of dangerous looking toads) and settled them down.

The girl had lost the little finger on her right hand, and still had a throwing knife sticking out of her shoulder. A tiny fire was enough to heat up the knife and cauterize the stub of her finger, and there were plenty of bandages for her shoulder.

Winter gave her the sleeping bag.

It was about an hour later when she woke up. Winter offered her some saltine crackers and water, ignoring the girl’s suspicious glance. Clearly too hungry to turn it down, she ate the food, and then assessed her surroundings and personal state.

She seemed surprised to see that she was in a sleeping bag, with her wounds bandaged.

That made sense, Winter supposed, given the general environment they’d been in lately.

“You helped me? Instead of leaving me to die?”

Winter shrugged. “Oh, it was no bother. I’m used to blood.”

The girl looked even more suspicious. Winter explained. “Not because I kill people regularly. Just because I’m a girl. Also, the walls bleed sometimes, especially around the time of the games. It’s inevitable, so I’ve gotten used to it. Your nubbly finger was nothing too bad.” She took a dainty bite of her own saltine cracker. “I’m Winter, by the way.”

She now no longer looked suspicious, just a little alarmed and worried. “I know.”

No name in return. Oh well, Winter could work with that.

Her new friend finished the water and crackers, so Winter handed her a piece of beef jerky. She’d finished it as well before she finally seemed to have worked through what had happened to land her here and possibilities going forward (at least, that’s what Winter would have been thinking about, but her friend could have been thinking about the usage of mining rods, for all she knew).

“Scarlet. My name is Scarlet.”

Winter gave her a smile in return. “Nice to meet you properly, Scarlet-friend. How long do you think we can stay in this cave before Aimery sends some mutt or ‘natural’ disaster after us?”

“I left my ally out there in the middle of a fight and I don’t know if he’s alive! I can’t just sit here doing nothing!”

“Hm, I lost track of Jacin as well, but if you go out there a mere two hours after getting a knife thrown into you, you won’t last very long. We’ll just have to look after each other in the meantime.”

Scarlet glared at her. “Couldn’t you pick up a weapon and help fight?”

“No.”

A growl of annoyance was Scarlet’s only response. Winter ignored her. She figured they had probably twenty-four hours until they were forced out of the cave. The excitement of four tributes being killed at once would keep the Capitol satiated for long enough for the two of them to get some rest and heal.

Unless another tribute found them, of course, but what can you do?

Chapter Text

Welcome to Hell.

It wasn’t the fire and brimstone she’d expected. It was the sun beating down, sucking water through your teeth and then spitting out the grit, not having enough food for one of you, let alone both, and wishing the tiny lizards were just a bit slower. Watching the water that had almost been your destruction and now was your only salvation dry up, listening to the death knell of the cannons, sounding ever closer.

It had been almost a week since the flood. Though she’d managed to find a pack in the washout, and keep them alive this long, Cress hadn’t seen any other tributes. Thorne hadn’t seen anything at all. When his head hit the log he’d stayed conscious thanks to the rushing water and pelting rain, but he’d lost his sight.

They’d found a tree root above the water level not long after that and had managed to stay alive until the flood had died down and led them out to a flood plain. Thorne had given her his axe with a forced casual air and comment of “Here you go, sweetheart. I bet carrying that takes you from pretty cute to total babe, so don’t lose it ‘til I get my sight back and can see you, kay?”

She’d been too tired to blush. Almost. But he couldn’t see so he’d never know.

They’d been washed so far south, that combined with the difficulty of walking while blind and running low on resources, they’d taken the entire week to leave the desert and get back to the rest of the arena.

Cress started crying when she saw the lake.

Hearing her sniffles, Thorne clumsily placed a hand on her shoulder. “Woah, no crying out here, remember? Can’t waste the water!”

She laughed thickly. “We’ve nearly reached the lake, Carswell. We’ve made it out of the desert.”

The smile that he gave her was so big and happy it seemed brighter than the gamemakers’ desert sun.

Her heart skipped several beats at the sight, and then Thorne picked her up by the waist and spun her around.

She almost fell over on her weak knees when he set her down.

The mile left to walk to the lake was the longest mile of her life. It felt like she was still in the desert, seeing mirages of water that never really got closer.

Eventually they reached the slate covered shores and Cress sloshed into the cool water, holding Thorne’s hand so he could follow after her. They filled their water bottles and drank carefully, relishing the clean water.

***

They’d been too casual. He should have known better. There had been more than enough time to get the water they needed and get out of there. But the lake had felt so good that he’d ignored the danger of staying there too long.

He heard the crunch on the rocks behind him the same time he heard Cress’s scream.

Out of instinct he dropped to a crouch and dove to the side, the sharp rocks cutting into his hands, his knees, his back. He didn’t know if Cress’s scream had been in terror or pain. She could be dead, bleeding out in the shallow waters or caught by the reeds that lined the banks.

Running, weaving back and forth to avoid—something, he didn’t know, didn’t know what was coming—until he tripped over his own feet and fell. The sound of footsteps running, sliding on the loose stone toward him. He scrambled backwards, going nowhere, nowhere except up in a hover ship and then into an expensive casket in the family mausoleum.

He’d known it was coming, his death. It had always been one of his options. Go into the arena and win, go into the arena and die, or be forcibly recruited as a “pleasure boy” for the Capitol. District 1 supplied luxuries, after all.

Death was probably better than that at least, though he wished he could see what was happening.

Wet splattered his face, and a body fell on top of his sprawled legs.

Scared to move, Thorne held still. Waiting. Someone else had survived to kill whoever was bleeding all over his boots, but he couldn’t hear anything. Either they were gone, taking the one kill as enough, or they were biding their time, knowing he was blind.

Maybe it was Cress.

He hoped it was Cress.

The sound of retching and knees falling to the shale set him into motion.

He pushed the body off his legs and scrambled around, reaching until he felt the rough wood handle of the axe in the head of the tribute. Not the shiny, sleek stuff made by the Capitol. It was Cinder's axe. His axe. Cress’s axe. He pulled it out of the body (almost losing the contents of his stomach himself, little though they were) so their one weapon wouldn’t be lost when the hover ship came.

Cress was sobbing quietly now, and he followed the sound until he could kneel down next to her. He placed a hand on her back and she startled. He wrapped her in a hug. “I’m sorry, Cress, but we need to get out of here.”

She took a few deep breaths, trying to calm her sobs, and helped him locate their supplies, before they trudged off into the woods. As soon as she deemed them safe she collapsed again, back into Thorne’s arms. “We’re supposed to be kids. I’m 16. I should be getting in trouble for cutting class. Not killing.”

Thorne rubbed circles on her back. “You’ve got to be careful saying those things, the Capitol can hear everything we say.” He sighed and whispered in her ear. “But I agree with you.”

***

Night fell and the sky lit up with the face of the tributes who died that day. There had been four that morning, and then the one Cress had killed, a boy from district 11. She shrank back as his face lit up the sky, and then sat in silence as the anthem played a final time and faded out, the trees dark above, no stars peeking through, just a sliver of light from the false moon.

In the trunk of a hollow tree, Cress tried to forget, but the scene kept playing, seeing the boy behind Thorne, running back to shore, pulling out the axe and throwing it, not knowing, not thinking what it would do, could do. Watching over and over again as it struck true.

The moonlight that spilled into their space in the tree trunk shone on Thorne’s face. He was still covered in the blood of the boy.

She took out a canteen and tore a strip of cloth from her shirt. Thorne looked up at the sound. “What—”

The blood had to go. It had dried in the time since, but came off almost completely under her ministrations. Thorne didn’t question, didn’t say anything at all until she was done. She knew he couldn’t see her, but felt like he was watching her movements, studying her.

Covered in blood now, the cloth fell by her side, and she studied his now blood-free face in return. He reached out a hand for hers, “You’re a good person, Cress. I know there’s no chance of both of us getting out of this arena alive, but if there was, I’d want to know you’re okay, tomorrow and the next and maybe a few years after that as well.”

She took his hand. “I think I love you, Carswell.”

His face became contemplative. “I’ve told a lot of people I loved them. I don’t think I ever meant it. But I don’t want to say it now in case it sounds cheap. But—Aces, Cress, I wish I could see you right now—I might—I mean—Gah, I’ve never been this lost for words before, I’m not quite sure what to do.”

Cress did.

She turned his face toward her and moved closer, tilting her head and leaving the lightest of kisses on his lips before brushing their noses together and backing up so she could look into his unfocused eyes. “Do you know now?”

Without hesitation he pulled her close again, his soft lips caressing hers.

She was kneeling next to him inside the hollow of the tree, and something inside of her acted when she usually wouldn’t have the bravery. The intrepid explorer or movie star or femme fatale she always dreamed up in her fictions, maybe. She broke the kiss long enough to shift her weight and throw a leg over his waist, straddling him as she deepened their embrace. His hands found her waist and pulled her closer, trailing burning kisses across her jaw to the spot behind her ear that made her melt with a gasp. She returned the favor gladly, kissing along the stubble on his jaw before finding the pulse in his neck, kissing it softly and then with more fervor, smiling against his skin as his pulse sped up, and a small moan escaped his mouth.

With a final kiss that became soft and sweet, they broke apart, hearts racing. Cress curled into his side and watched as his eyes dropped closed in sleep.

Tomorrow was a new day with new dangers.

But they got tonight.

Chapter Text

He shifted uncomfortably in his plush seat before sighing and rising to his feet, dress shoes shining. Cress had just made things easy for him in the sponsor department, but it was just so dang uncomfortable when the game makers showed romance. And if there was romance in the games, it was a sure bet it would make it on the screen.

Five people had died that day, but the nation was watching (and listening to, unfortunately) two teens making out in a hollow tree trunk. Not that Kai begrudged them what happiness they could get at the moment, but there were plenty of other scenes the game makers could be showing, if the Capitol citizens weren’t perverts and voyeurs.

Time to go charm some sponsors gifts out of said capitol Citizens.

Some less than subtle flirting and references to Cress and Thorne had gotten a parachute sent in (sponsored by a woman in platform shoes with fish in the heels who barely took her eyes of the HD screen in front of her). He felt sick to his stomach, but at least now Cress (and Thorne, he was sure she’d share) would have a good meal to fill their stomachs after their trek through the desert. He’d even been able to use the sponsor’s distracted state to finagle a gift for Cinder as well.

He hadn’t seen her in days. The game makers hadn’t shown her since the immediate aftermath of the flood, cursing and kicking a tree stump, trying not to cry after her friends had washed away to certain death, as far as she knew. There had been enough other stuff going on that the Capitol hadn’t needed check-ins with the remaining tributes to fill the broadcast.

Kai only knew she was alive because of her absence. If she was dead, she would have showed up in the sky, and her death broadcast, even if it was “boring,” just starving or freezing to death.

He should be grateful for the quiet, then.

But he wanted to see that she was alright—or as much as possible in the arena.

Wherever she was, she could probably use some support, some help. The parachute gift wasn’t much, just a pack of beef jerky, but he’d added a note as well: “Stay safe, hold on, fight hard, come back. -K.”

The hall had been empty, just Kai sitting on the ground, head tilted back to rest against the wall, but slowly his nose filled with the slight scent of burning unsuccessfully covered by overwhelming flowery perfume. He hurried to his feet and scanned the space for a hiding place, but it was already too late.

President Levana stepped around a corner, her graceful and stately footsteps near silent. She was beautiful, Kai couldn’t deny it, but since he’d first met her at the victor ceremony for his own games, she’d seemed off. Something about her perfectly proportioned and symmetrical face was too fake, an impression that was strengthened by her actions, which held only a veneer of civility and sweetness over a cruel core.

Kai smiled politely and kissed her hand as she greeted him, anyway, trying not to shiver. How else was he supposed to treat the woman who held what remained of his family and friends (after she’d killed his father) in a choke hold?

“Hinode Kaito, how wonderful to see you.”

“And you, Madam President. How are you enjoying this year’s games?”

Her saccharine smile grew, stretching just a bit too wide and taking on a predatory glint. “It is wonderful, as it is every year. Congratulations on the first district 3 kill of the games. Who would have expected that slip of a girl had it in her?”

Luckily Kai had established himself in the Capitol as a man of few words, even as his mind often overflowed with them, and all that was expected in response was a nod.

Levana took a step forward, and then another, until her chest was pressed against his. He didn’t allow himself to step back, as that would have put his back against the wall, and tried not to show his discomfort and revulsion but must not have succeeded. She chuckled, low and dangerous, and he felt the laugh resonate through her body against his. “I’ll expect to see you at the mentor’s dinner tonight.” She leaned forward to kiss his cheek, laughing again when he shivered and twitched away. Her hand snaked around the back of his neck, sharp nails scratching the skin beneath his collar as she pulled him forward and bit his ear, and then licked the pulse point in his neck. “Ten o’clock, don’t be late. We have so much to discuss.”

She finally slithered past him, keeping contact for as long as she could before her heels clicked off down the hall behind him.

Once he could no longer hear her footsteps, Kai yanked off his sash and scrubbed at his skin where she’d touched. That woman set all his nerves on edge. He’d rather go back in the arena than face this every day.

He took off in the opposite direction, running through the halls of the sponsor center until he was outside. His entire life was going to be variations on that, or worse, unless he did something. One year and he was already going mad.

If he could get a message to his family, get them out of three before anyone noticed…

Where would they go, though? He had to make sure they were safe before he could leave the Capitol himself, or they would be tortured and killed.

His feet pounded against the sidewalk of the ostentatious streets, dress shoes sliding on the marble. He was tall, a fast runner, and his legs had carried him to the main square before he realized how far he’d gone. Giant screens faced every building. Some showed advertisements, but most focused on the Hunger Games.

For the first time in a week, Cinder showed up on screen, jolting out of a light sleep under a cover of leaves as she heard the pinging sound of the parachute arriving. Careful and quiet, cast in green from the night vision cameras, she reached up to the branches of the tree above her. The parachute was carefully folded and added to her pack, as was the container. The beef jerky was torn open with a slight moan of happiness, and she started chewing on a piece as she stowed the rest. Then she looked at the note, tilting it to catch the low light of the nighttime arena. The audience couldn’t read what Kai had written, but Cinder ran her thumb, the metal one, across the ink. He saw her smile, lopsided and endearing around her mouthful of food. She must have read it a few more times, judging by how long she looked at the paper, before tucking it away inside her boot, and Kai thought it was inside the metal storage compartment in her leg, even. She looked around until she found a camera, spotting it by the tiny LED in the darkness. She stared for a minute before nodding, and he knew it was for him.

“Stay safe, hold on, fight hard, come back.”

She’d heard him. And he was going to get her out of there. Cinder and Cress, and any anyone else he could. A little longer in the Capitol would be worth it.

Chapter Text

It feels wrong, Cinder thought, to be bored during the Hunger Games.

Really though, it had been a very repetitive, if stressful week. After escaping the flash flood in the gorge, Cinder had tried to look for Thorne and Cress, but had been cut off by a couple of district 7 tributes and had to flee back into the forest. Two cannons had sounded shortly after, and by the time the nightly parade of faces across the sky had ended, and she realized they weren’t dead, it was too late to look for them. They’d be who knows where, washed out of the gorge and then either hidden away or traveling.

So, she’d stayed put within a couple of square miles, setting snares to catch food, purifying water from the stream, and twisting what felt like a metric ton of cordage. The cornucopia was still too dangerous to steal from, but even so she had almost more weapons than she could reasonably carry. A couple of axes, a bola, a spear, and a blowgun, though it had taken her a while to figure out how to make darts for that one. And it wasn’t like the little bone and feather darts would kill someone, so she didn’t know why she bothered.

Upon waking up on the 9^th day in the arena, Cinder rolled out of her pile of leaves, swished a bit of water around her mouth and started walking. The fact that she’d gotten a parachute last night, after doing nothing for so long, meant that something must have happened with Cress, either good or bad. Either way, the Capitol always showed tributes receiving parachutes because it made the sponsors look good, so they now knew she existed, even if she’d blended into the background for the past week. It was time to move.

It wasn’t easy to be quiet with a metal leg in underbrush, so Cinder kept her spear handy, scanning the forest as she moved. The trees rustled around her, lush and green, and the stream she left behind burbled cheerfully. She took a moment to appreciate the landscape. The factories of district 3 had long ago leveled their forests, so before the arena she’d never seen trees as green or as plentiful as these.

Shame it was all fake.

Cinder heard a branch crack behind her and spun around, spear at the ready. Instead of a tribute, poised to attack, two mutts stalked toward her, boars nearly as tall as she was, exaggerated tusks lethally pointed and hooves the size of her hand with all five fingers spread wide.

She ran.

Fighting people was a nightmare, but her weapons were prepared for it. These mutts, however, probably had hide strong enough to break the sharp stone of her axe, and her spear was no better. Two mutts at once was way beyond her.

It was clear that she was being driven by the animals, not just attacked, as they were likely fast enough to catch up and gut her with no problems. Her assumption was confirmed when she stumbled into a clearing with four other people already glaring tensely at each other, weapons ready.

Seeing the mutts retreat, their job done, Cinder assessed the others. Standing by himself, splattered in dried blood with a wicked looking short sword in his grasp and a blank, haunted look on his face was the large tribute from 10. He glanced over at her before turning back to the other three who’d stumbled into the clearing, four boar mutts at their back. Cinder recognized the blond boy who’d volunteered to protect the President’s stepdaughter, though the girl herself was nowhere to be seen. The other tributes with him were probably also from district two if earlier alliances had remained until now. They looked healthier as well, even after upwards of a week surviving off the arena’s meager offerings.

Cinder raised her free hand, the metal one, in an almost placating gesture, though she kept her weapon ready. “Hi, everyone.” Her voice was cautious, but she hoped the fact that she spoke at all instead of just attacking would postpone the fighting for a moment. “I don’t want to kill any of you, and I don’t want to die, so how about we all just turn around and leave?”

From behind her came the distinctly un-boar-like snarl of the mutts, echoed from the other side of the clearing, and the mutts, who had not left after all but just retreated, returned and lingered, until they were forming a perimeter, keeping the tributes from escaping the clearing. One of the district two tributes gave her a sorry grimace before his face melted back into stoicism. “I would agree with you, but it seems like the two of you have to die.”

He raised his machete, but before he could rush forward and attack, a deep war cry burst from the district 10 tribute, and he raised his short sword to attack. The other four tributes tensed even further, ready to defend, but instead of attacking them, 10 turned and stabbed his weapon through the skull of the mutt behind him, right between the eyes. It dropped to the ground before any of the others could react, and he turned to a second mutt, its tusks batting his sword away from a fatal blow and forcing him to jump backward so he wouldn’t be gored.

Cinder raced to join him, dropping to her knees next to 10, she braced her spear on the ground. The boar, which had been rushing to attack a swordsman, ran itself right onto the spear, and though she’d been worried her weapons wouldn’t hold up against the hid of the mutts, with the full weight of the animal behind the strike, the spear pierced clean through. The boar slid down the haft, still alive, and almost took her eye out before 10, given an opening by its halted momentum, killed this mutt like the last one.

Cinder let go of her spear and then pulled it through from the other side of the boar, entire haft now slick with the blood of the mutt. The death of the two boars had taken maybe six seconds total, but six remained. As Cinder braced her spear again, ready for one of the charging boars, she caught the eye of the district 10 tribute. “Cinder.”

He nodded, before looking back at the mutts. “Wish we could meet under better circumstances, Cinder. I’m…” he hesitated. “I’m Wolf.”

The spear-sword combo worked on one more boar before they seemed to wise up, or the gamemakers got a programing change entered, because they stopped charging and attacked in short bursts instead, swinging their heads to catch the tributes on their tusks.

Across the clearing the district 2 tributes were dealing with their own attackers, four boars to the three of them. One boar fell, leaving their numbers even. Cinder was grateful they’d attacked the mutts as well, as they could have easily attacked her and Wolf when their backs were turned.

Spear no longer useful, Cinder drew one of her axes and tried to hack at the boar’s face, more as a distraction than killing blows. The tip of a tusk caught the edge of her bicep and tore a chunk of flesh out, more painful even than the arrow through her side. Wolf slashed across its neck hard enough that the capitol tempered and sharpened steel cut halfway through its neck, and it dropped lifeless to the forest floor.

A cry of anguish from the other side of the clearing caught their attention, and the watched as the girl from 2 was gored by both tusks, entering her gut and curving up under her ribs. The force of the attack lifted her off the ground, before the mutt tossed her like a ragdoll to the side. The cannon sounded before she hit the ground.

Without a sound, no war cry or shout of anger, the blonde tribute jumped onto the back of the boar and drove a knife between its eyes.

Two boars left. Wolf and Cinder sprinted across the clearing and took down one of the remaining mutts, and the others tackled the last. They died at almost the same time, but the district two boar, with its dying throes, speared the taller district 2 tribute through the throat.

They fell to the ground together.

Wolf stood watch for any other mutts or tributes as the others knelt by the dying boy. Blood burbled from his mouth, and he seized in pain, but took his friend’s hand. Words barely intelligible, he spoke. “I’m sorry, Jacin. Find her.”

The cannon boomed.

Jacin’s face was set like stone as he closed the boy’s eyes, and then took his machete and supply pack. “His name was Liam.”

Cinder stood and walked to the side of the girl, closing her eyes as well, and moving her dark braid to lay over her shoulder. The tip of her spear was broken. Jacin looked over. “Her name was Fateen.”

The three living tributes exchanged tense glances. Jacin wiped his sword clean on some leaves and sheathed it before speaking. “I still don’t want to kill you. We can all leave now, the path is clear.”

Wolf didn’t bother cleaning his weapon. “I’m looking for my ally. Red hair. She hasn’t shown up in the sky, but I can’t find her.”

“No, I’m sorry, I haven’t seen her.” She turned to Jacin. “Haven’t seen Winter either. I’m assuming you haven’t seen my allies, so I won’t ask.”

The three of them sat in silence for another moment before Jacin sighed in frustration. “I hate that I’m suggesting this, truly, but we should stick together until we find our people. Other than us and those we’re looking for, there are still six tributes, along with Capitol creations. Safety in numbers.”

Wolf just nodded once, and that was settled. Until they found Scarlet, Winter, Thorne, and Cress, or they were all dead, they were allies.

Chapter Text

It was as the anthem played that night that they reached the lake. The artificial moon above them in the arena sky reflected on the water, rippling gently. Also reflected upside-down, next to the moon, were the faces of Liam and Fateen, their Capitol curated portraits noble, as if they were proud to be in the Hunger Games. As painful as it was, Cinder chose to remember them instead as they died: just two kids thrown into this mess, scared.

She hated that anthem.

“Do you ever wonder how long before you’re up there, your death an entertainment lighting the sky, cheered by drums and horns?”

No one responded her acerbic comment. Jacin just ignored her entirely. Wolf looked over at her, and then bent to pick up rocks on the shore. After a moment she realized he was comparing them to an axe of hers that had broken during the fight. He silently handed a few over, along with the broken axe that he must have picked up off the ground after she tossed it aside.

She took them with a quiet “thank you,” and started unwinding the cordage from the broken stone. The handle was still fine. Hopefully she wouldn’t be in the arena long enough to Theseus’s Ship the whole thing.

Wolf settled in to watch their surroundings, and Cinder took out some of her precious beef jerky for dinner. She chewed slowly to savor it as long as she could, but it was still gone far too quickly. The shale next to her crunched and she heard a sigh. Jacin crouched down with a pack of crackers and held it out. She offered some jerky in return.

Her movement must have drawn his notice, as he grabbed her arm, causing her to wince. “Cinder, what happened to your arm?”

She looked down at the bandage, now soaked through with blood. At least she thought it was. The moon was shining from the opposite direction, so it could have just been shadow. “Oh. The boar’s tusk tore off a chunk. It’ll be fine. I’m used to working with injuries from when I used to be at the factories.”

Jacin did not look at all reassured by that. Though they only lived one district apart by number, they were worlds different in some respects. She was sure he was worked hard and treated poorly in peacekeeper training, but it was a different sort of abuse and neglect than in the factories. Peacekeepers had to be healthy and strong enough to quell insurrection, after all.

He turned her around so that the wound was facing the moonlight, and sighed again at what was now definitely identifiable as blood soaked through the bandage. “Listen, avulsions are not light injuries. Let me take a look at it or it’s likely to get infected.”

She let him take off the bandage and sat stoically as he cleaned the wound with water. “I wish we had a needle. Enough of your skin is still attached that we could fold it over and suture it shut if we had the right tools.”

At her look of curiosity, Jacin, for the first time, offered information about himself. It was said so quietly she could barely hear. “I want to become a doctor. It’s not out of the realm of possibility for those in 1 and 2, but I got drafted into peacekeeper training instead. I just self-study now.”

He still held her injured arm in place, but with her free hand she reached into her pouch and pulled out one of the feather darts for her blow gun. Jacin looked at her like she was crazy, but carefully took the dart from her and examined it. “Fish bone?”

She nodded. “I know it’s not ideal, and there’s no hole for a thread, but if you took off the feathers and pulled some fibers off the long edge of the bandage for thread it might work.”

Straightening his back, brow furrowing in concentration, Jacin got to work.

The needle was sticking halfway through the skin and muscle of her bicep when they all heard a sound. Leaving the surgical tools where they were (including in Cinder’s arm—thank goodness it was her non-dominant one), they drew weapons and followed Wolf into the brush. Jacin watched their backs.

Wolf seemed to have sharper ears than either of the others, as he seemed to have a pretty good idea of where they were heading, hearing small noises that they missed after the initial louder noise. With the shale no longer crunching underfoot they moved a lot quieter, but Cinder was still baffled by how Wolf, standing at least half a foot taller than her, could be so silent as he stalked through the brush.

No doubt the cameras were broadcasting this to all of Panem. There was the expectation of action of the horizon.

Instead, however, she saw around Wolf’s broad shoulder a short girl with blonde hair and a tall-ish, classically handsome boy with a blindfold tied around his eyes.

Never let it be said that Cinder was a hugger, but she was so glad to see her friends alive (she’d even give Thorne the title, grudgingly), that she yelped in surprise, shoved her axe through her belt, and tackled Cress with a one-armed hug. Thorne looked alarmed, as far as she could tell with his eyes covered, but relaxed when she cried his name and gave him a hug as well. “I’m so glad you guys aren’t dead!”

She pulled back to assess their condition. Cress looked pale and even smaller than usual, and in addition to the blindfold Thorne was splattered in someone else’s dried blood, but they both seemed injury free. Cress gave her a smile. “Good to see you too. I assume these two scary guys are on your side?”

Cinder turned around to see Wolf and Jacin, who were still on alert, though not as worried about Cress and Thorne anymore. “Yep, we’re all looking for our allies and friends. You’re welcome to stay with us until we find their partners, and then we can all decide what to do from there.”

The group gathered their materials from the lakeside, finished stitching up Cinder’s arm, and retreated a mile or two into the trees before settling down for the night. As the others debated whether it was safe to build a fire, Cinder’s gaze was caught by a small, innocuous movement from Cress. To anyone else it would just look like she was rubbing her thumb and middle finger together as a nervous habit, but to a factory worker from district 3? That was the beginning to a message.

Maybe it had been a coincidence. Cinder had never seen Cress in the factories when she worked there. She thought she’d spent her time locked away in Sybil Mira’s house. But maybe…

Cinder returned the gesture, but with her thumb and pointer finger: ‘ready to receive message.’

If this was being broadcast, anyone in district 3 (sans the foremen and a few elites like, thankfully, adri, pearl, and Sybil Mira), would know what they were saying to each other. They’d have to trust in the discretion of their fellow district members.

The next sign language phrase followed, just as subtle as the first, confirmation that it wasn’t a fluke, that Cress was trying to tell her something: ‘Work ending early. Need supplies. Foreman watching. Trust me.’

It wasn’t entirely clear, as the signs were, by necessity of being subtle, restricted to factory related things and general basics.

But it seemed like Cress was hatching an escape plan.

Cinder sent a confirmation of ‘message received’ and volunteered for first watch as the discussion about a fire was winding down. Cress volunteered to watch with her. Thorne sat by her on a fallen log, unable to keep watch with his eyesight gone, but waiting up with (Cinder was starting to suspect) his girlfriend instead of huddling alone on the cold ground.

The absence of a fire let their eyes adjust to the dark, and Cinder felt fairly confident in her ability to see if anything was approaching.

After half an hour of scanning the forest, Cress stood up (eliciting a small sound of displeasure from Thorne). “I’m gonna see if I can see anything from the top of a tree. It might give a different view, or let me see a fire across the arena.”

Cinder affected an image of barely paying attention, still keeping an eye out at ground level, but watched Cress out of the corner of her eye as she climbed a tree. She suspected this was part of the plan.

The tree that Cress had chosen to climb was a dozen meters away, and the low branches creaked as she pulled herself up. Cinder watched as the girl pulled herself higher and higher in the tree, until she reached for a branch and it snapped, sending her plummeting back to ground, crashing into other branches on the way down before slamming into the ground, broken branch still in her hand.

Cinder and Thorne both jumped to their feet. She was the only one that had seen it happen, but Thorne had heard Cress pinball down the tree, and it seemed like the other boys were waking as well with the commotion. Cinder led Thorne around the trees until they reached Cress, still lying on the ground and just regaining the breath that had been knocked out of her.

Thorne helped her to her feet and she threw her arms around him, under his jacket. “Are you a-alright?”

His voice seemed to stutter on one of the words, but Cinder still couldn’t read his expressions with the blindfold. Worry, she supposed.

When Cress let go of Thorne, the broken branch was gone, and Thorne was standing much straighter.

They headed back to the campsite where Wolf and Jacin had woken up and Jacin checked Cress for broken bones. As he diagnosed her with bruised ribs, she signaled to Cinder again: ‘supplies acquired. Camera. Tech. Hack. Need safe space.”

So that had been her plan. Cress had planned to fall twenty feet down the tree just to inconspicuously grab the broken branch that had actually been a camera and it’s support limb. Now she just needed a place away from Capitol eyes to use the smart tech inside the camera and hack into the gamemaker's system.

Cinder thought for a second, and then slowly spelled back ‘C-o-r-n-u-c-o-p-i-a.”

Chapter Text

“Hey, Crazy, are you trying to get us killed?”

Winter turned back to look at her, scars on her cheek creasing with a wide smile. “Please, it’s like you don’t trust me at all! We’re lifelong friends, I think you can take my word on this!”

With a skeptical eye, Scarlet looked on as Winter skipped across the stones in the stream and headed toward the smoke beacon rising above the trees, miles away. “I’ve known you for maybe five days. ‘Lifelong’ might be a stretch.”

The other girl pouted, but Scarlet ignored her and kept speaking. “Anyone who’s survived this long into the games and is lighting a fire that big is either luring people into a trap, or are in a group, and we’re only two people. This is a really bad idea.”

Winter hummed and looked at the bright blue morning sky in consideration. “Well, I disagree, but you’re allowed to have your opinion.”

Then she turned and kept strolling in the direction of the smoke flare.

Scarlet growled in frustration and stomped along behind.

After another five minutes of silence, Winter spoke back over her shoulder. “You don’t have to come with me if you think it’s too dangerous. We could go our separate ways.”

She was trying to sound nonchalant about it but didn’t quite get the tone right. Maybe Scarlet would have believed her if it was anyone else, but Winter was a very open person, and even when she tried to hide her feelings they tended to be written across her face.

A quick jog brought Scarlet up so she was walking next to Winter, instead of behind her. “I might consider it, but unfortunately, I really do like you. I wouldn’t leave a friend behind to certain death alone when it could be certain death together, yeah?” She put a hand on Winter’s arm to stop her and looked up into her expressive face. “I’m a complainer. Don’t give it any thought. I just wanted to make sure we knew the risks. But Winter. I’ve got your back, and I won’t hurt you or leave you behind. Even after we find Jacin and Ze’ev, I’ll only leave when you want me to.”

Winter studied her face for a few seconds and then smiled, not her usual playful, exuberant smile, but a small one of thanks. “Thank you, Scarlet.”

Then without warning, she turned back to the path through the trees and linked her arm with Scarlet’s dragging them along. “And we’re almost there, so you’ll either get to see that I’m right, or prove you are! How convenient.

***

One thing that Scarlet definitely didn’t expect was running into trouble before they reached the probably-a-death-sentence smoke beacon. Laying on her back in the concrete pit, she could see it in the near distance. She’d laugh if the breath hadn’t been knocked out of her.

With a groan, Scarlet pushed herself to sitting and assessed their surroundings. Winter looked dazed but uninjured, sprawled across Scarlet’s legs. The pit was a good twelve feet deep with smooth, industrial looking sides that identified it as of Capitol make, not a trap another tribute had left. Luckily the false forest floor that had been covering it had softened their fall, or they would have broken bones at the very least.

The two girls climbed to their feet. Winter’s cheerful state seemed shaken as she detangled a stick from her hair “Well that was a surprise.”

Scarlet didn’t answer, busy trying to find a way out of the pit. Did the Capitol expect them to starve here? Or kill each other? What was the play? She ran her hands over the walls of the pit. Oddly, upon closer inspection, the walls weren’t just smooth concrete, but covered in thousands of evenly spaced little holes, each a few millimeters wide. She, admittedly, didn’t know much about construction, but there was no way that had a structural purpose.

It was unsettling.

An hour later they sat on the forest floor debris and ate some berries, a bit more scuffed than before after trying to boost each other up the wall. An ant crawled across Scarlet’s shoe and she watched it work its way slowly across the forest debris.

“I’m pretty sure my grandma is dead, not just missing.”

The statement came out of the blue, and Winter looked over at her, confused. “What?”

Scarlet sighed. “Well, I figure the Capitol is trying to kill us in this pit anyway, I may as well speak my mind. They’ll cut the cameras away anyway.” She popped another berry in her mouth (too sour) and ate it before speaking. “My grandma disappeared one day while I was in the fields. I returned to find the house in perfect order, except she was gone. I looked for days, missing work and receiving some serious punishments. The head peacekeeper was awfully smug when I asked him about her disappearance, and Gran would never leave of her own volition without telling me. It’s been long enough that I’m sure she was killed, either by the peacekeepers in 9 or taken to the Capitol and used for something awful.”

Winter leaned her shoulder against Scarlet’s. “I was put through the wringer in the Capitol labs, and I turned out fine. Except for the hallucinations. But what can you do?”

She knew Winter was trying to make her feel better, but it didn’t really work. The chances she’d see her Gran again were infinitesimal.

Another few ants marched across her boot.

And then she looked up at the wall, at all the holes.

Ants were crawling from every hole in the pit.

Scarlet leapt to her feet, startling Winter, and looked around frantically, but there was nothing she could do. Before long they covered the floor of the pit, and they were kept busy brushing them off of their bodies as the tiny insects started to bite them. She’d never been scared of bugs before, but she was now.

She screamed as they started to crawl across her face and fall out of her hair, but that was a mistake that allowed several ants to slip into her mouth. Others were crawling into her nose.

Across the pit, Winter seemed incredibly calm, but Scarlet could see her hands shaking and her movements get slower as she withdrew inside her head.

The worst part was that she could tell the bites weren’t what would kill them. They would just be swarmed, buried alive in ants that would crawl into their lungs and suffocate them.

Out of the forest above them Scarlet heard the pounding of footsteps, and looked up, unsure whether this would be her savior or just someone willing to offer a quicker death. And standing at the top of the pit, peering down in alarm, was Ze’ev. She gasped in surprise, and then had to cough out the ants she’d just inhaled. By the time she’d cleared her airway he’d waved over someone else and they’d thrown down a rope.

There was no time to lose, as the layer of ants at the base of the pit was getting thicker. Scarlet grabbed Winter’s arm, ants squashing under her fingers, and dragged the nearly unresponsive girl over to the rope, tying it in a quick loop under her arms. The boys at the top quickly lifted her out of the pit, and then threw the rope back down for Scarlet. Back in district 9 she would have been able to climb the rope hand over hand without help, but ten days in the arena had not been kind to her. She slipped the loop around herself and let them hoist her up as well. Ants continued to crawl all over her as she slid against the wall of the pit, sloughing off to fall below.

Finally she was dragged over the edge of the pit, and immediately shed the rope. She frantically started brushing the ants off of her, desperate to have them gone. When it was clear that they were still crawling under her clothes, she shucked her jacket, shirt, and pants without a care for the other people standing around or the Capitol cameras.

All the ants were gone, finally, but she still brushed at her skin, shaking, the ghost of them still running across her skin. Two large hands gently took hers and stilled them. Scarlet looked up at the dirty, hollowed-out, unshaven face of Ze’ev, and launched herself into his arms, wracked with sobs. He didn’t say anything, just hummed comfortingly and rubbed circles on her back. With her ear pressed to him, she could feel the hums reverberate through his chest, calming her.

It was a while before she felt rational enough to back away and look around. Winter was sitting on the ground, wrapped in the embrace of the boy that could only be Jacin from her descriptions. He was picking dead ants out of her hair talking to her slowly as she returned to the present, blinking away the glazed look in her eyes. Standing some distance away was another boy with a blindfold tied over his eyes and a short blonde girl, both respectfully looking away from the emotional displays. The last person in the group was a girl with dark hair and eyes, a prosthetic hand, and an odd collection of stick and twine creations hanging from a bandolier she’d made out of part of her jacket. She handed Scarlet her pants and shirt with a small smile. “They’re—I can’t exactly say clean, but at least ant-free now?”

She returned the smile and pulled on her clothes before turning back to Ze’ev. He pressed a kiss to her forehead and pulled her back into his arms. “I was so worried about you.”

Her voice was muffled in his shirt, but she didn’t care. “You were there to save me.”

He sighed. “I was worried the entire time you were gone, not just while you were in the pit.”

With a small cough interrupting the moment, the short blonde girl drew their attention. “Wolf, Jacin, we should probably head back to base, it’s going to get dark soon and the new careers will be on the hunt since no one arrived at their smoke flare.”

A part of Scarlet’s brain was proud of her earlier caution and wanted to gloat to Winter about being right, but a larger part was angry, turning to snarl at the alarmed blond girl. “His name is Ze’ev, not Wolf.”

A calming hand lands on her arm, and she turns to the tall boy. “I told them that was my name. It’s not their fault they’re using the Capitol moniker, it’s mine.”

The group started moving through the woods, and Scarlet kept her hand wrapped in his, even as he held a sword at the ready. “Why? Why not use your name?”

Their voices were low, low enough that the other members of their group wouldn’t be able to hear, and hopefully low enough that the Capitol wouldn’t be able to over the crunch of the underbrush. “I killed four people in anger when you went off that cliff. I became the killer the Capitol wanted me to, the beast from my nightmares.”

She pulled him to a stop and moved to stand in front of him, placing a hand on either side of his face. “Ze’ev Kesley. You are a good man. You are not what the Capitol makes you to be. You are your own person, placed in an impossible situation and fighting for your life. Do not judge yourself based on one moment of terror and danger.”

A tear fell from his eye, and she wiped it away with her thumb. “I love you, Ze’ev, and I trust you.” She took his hand again. “Now let’s catch up with the others.”

To Scarlet’s surprise, the group led them to the cornucopia, nearby enough that they had heard her scream and been able to rescue her. It was also with some shock that she realized they made up more than half of the tributes left in the arena, which was as good a reason as any to take the cornucopia and all its supplies, she supposed, but that meant that before long they’d have no choice but to fight each other.

Ze’ev and Jacin took up watch outside the structure while the others filed inside. It was quite stuffy and a little hot, but it was getting cold outside so she didn’t mind. She sat next to Winter and looked at the other three. The blind boy was looking bored, but the other two were fiddling with some piece of tech, which was odd because that wasn’t something that tributes usually had access to.

After a few minutes she sighed. “What are you working on, then?”

The girls startled and looked up from the device. The short blonde one gave a chagrined smile. “Sorry, we didn’t mean to ignore you! I’m Cress, this is Cinder and Thorne.” She gestured with the cable in her hand, and the metal-handed girl and the blind boy waved in turn. Her voice then lowered, not quite to a whisper, but low enough that if the space hadn’t been so closed in she would have had to lean forward to listen. “We got hold of one of the cameras and I’m hacking the smart tech inside of it. I’m confident that if we can contact someone on the outside to help us, we can escape the arena.”

A skeptical spark of hope flared inside Scarlet, but she tamped it down. She’d resigned herself to death and wouldn’t get her hopes up for something this risky.

Winter gasped, looking like herself for the first time since they’d fallen into the pit. “You can get us out of here?”

Cress wore a look of total determination as she answered. “Yes, or die trying. There are no cameras inside the cornucopia, so we’re safe to carry out our rebellion here.”

A small cry of triumph sounded from Cinder, who looked up and around as if noticing them there for the first time. “Oh, hi! Cress, I got the circuitry working, so it’s all up to you now.”

She turned back to the mess of wires sitting on the crate and started tapping away at a little screen. A tense few minutes of muttering later she let out a deep breath. “I’m through the Capitol’s security and have a code to use for contacting him. Here we go.”

And she sent the message.

Chapter Text

Kai watched the games from his apartment for once, appreciating that the late hour allowed it. That and the fact that his tributes had enough food and supplies now, and he didn’t have to spend every spare moment schmoozing for sponsors.

He wasn’t very old, but this was certainly the strangest Hunger Games he could remember during his lifetime. The outer districts were taking the role of careers, and all the careers had been wiped out or were allying outside of their standard groups. Not to mention the large group that had formed, gathering around the cornucopia. They’d all come together out of necessity, but he assumed once they met up with their original allies, they’d break into pairs again.  Instead, all seven of them had hunkered down in the cornucopia. There seemed to be only a minimal amount of tension, unlike many alliances in the past, constantly ready to erupt into violence.

The surviving male tributes from district 10 and 2, Ze’ev and Jacin, stood outside the Cornucopia. The night vision cameras cast them in a greenish light as they looked across the field toward the forest. Jacin shivered slightly in the cold night air of the arena, but Ze’ev was statue still. Kai still thought he looked more settled than he had the past few days. He’d been hard to get a read on when he was traveling with Cinder and Jacin, but now that that Scarlet was back he was clearly happier. The rest of their party seemed to have settled inside the Cornucopia, which was much safer and warmer than camping elsewhere. No cameras in there though since it was usually just full of supplies.

The personal communicator on Kai’s side table buzzed. He picked it up absently, watching as Thorne exited the Cornucopia and dropped to the ground between the two boys keeping guard. The message on his phone was from a hidden number and looked like gibberish, so Kai went to delete it, turning back to watch the screen and Thorne’s highly accurate and highly offensive impression of Caesar Flickerman echoing from inside the dark Cornucopia.

Something in the message stopped him, as his thumb hovered over the delete button. He’d never been amazing at computer code, having worked on the assembly line when in the factory, but he knew some. And in the middle of this message, which was starting to look more and more like obfuscated computer code, was a comment: “greeting 384.” Not very subtle, to anyone from district 3. It was a shorthand message hidden in the code comments written by the district 3 worker, its rather crass anti-Capitol meaning passed by word of mouth only, so it wouldn’t be understood by Capitol coders.

Kai sighed turned off his screen. He knew there were hidden cameras here, so it was unlikely he’d be able to decipher the code in the comfort of his living room, but as soon as he found somewhere away from prying electronic eyes, he had a long night ahead of him. Too bad there was no way for him to access a compiler unconnected to the Capitol systems.

***

Sitting in his bathtub with the curtain pulled, staring at the message he’d finally decoded around 2 am, Kai couldn’t deny that Cress Darnel might be the smartest person he knew. The message, still somewhat coded in its phrasing, was deceptively simple and could shake the country to its foundations if the tributes succeed in the plan she outlined:

      Scythe to the prince

      Work ending early, 1 day until launch. Help non-workers away:

                        Peacekeeper earth, cows

                        Mother of scary dogs, sheep

                        Maroon grandmother if living, farms

                        Garden sister the younger, home

                        Internal Kombustion Override

      The prince’s family

      //greeting 384 from the workers, the gearbox says “Ss, ho, fh, cb, prince, I await.”

Kai was honestly a little annoyed by the continued lack of clarity once he’d compiled the computer code, but once he understood who sent the message and what it was saying, he almost wished it had been more cryptic. It’s not that Kai was afraid of committing treason because he loved his country or something; Panem was a mess. He was more than a little scared of the consequences if he was caught and holding this scrap of paper with the final message it all seemed very real all of a sudden. District workers and victors alike were always discussing rebellion, but this one short note beamed from inside the arena straight to the Capitol got nearer than anything he’d ever heard.

Cress, Cinder, and the other contestants were breaking out of the arena. They had a plan. All they needed him to do was get their families and his to safety.

And himself. The last snippet of the message made that perfectly clear. Cinder must have helped Cress formulate the content of the message, even if Cress did the hacking. She’d sent a repeat of his message to her with the sponsor gift, “stay safe, hold on, fight hard, come back,” shortened to the first letter of each word. He wasn’t sure what she meant by “I await,” but it made warmth spread through his chest.

With a surge of energy that belied the long night, Kai sprung from his uncomfortable secret office in the cold bathtub and shook out his arms. There was still much to do, and he only had another 17 hours before his tributes snapped the timing belt of the arena and the Capitol machine ground into a chaotic, stuttering halt.

Chapter Text

“Are you sure you won’t regret leaving Adri and Pearl in district 3?”

“I already feel guilty about it, and that will just double if something happens to them. But I also know them well enough to be sure they’ll sell us out to the Capitol at the first opportunity.”

“I understand. I’d happily let Sybil Mira burn, but that guilt still gnaws away.”

Cinder stood outside the cornucopia in the early morning light, capitol-made axe in hand, rather than her homemade one. The night had felt endless, which she figured was as good an indication as any that they hadn’t messed with the sun cycles to cut the tributes’ sleep short. Ze’ev stood outside with her, taking a second watch, and Scarlet stood with him in silence, allowing him to keep his attention on the area surround them but just offering her presence.

The rubber coated handle of the axe squeaked in Cinder’s hand as she squeezed it tighter. Healthy caution or paranoia she wasn’t sure, but the quiet, almost peaceful morning unsettled her. This game was too close to its conclusion for a group this big, and while she trusted (to a degree) everyone in her group, she knew the Capitol wouldn’t let it stand for long.

They would have escaped last night if they didn’t have to worry about their families being killed.

Hopefully Kai got the message they sent.

Hopefully they’d given him enough time.

The sun finally rose above the trees behind her, instantly raising the temperature. Within a few minutes sweat was rolling down her back, the hair that had escaped her ponytail sticking to her neck uncomfortably. She shifted on her feet, wanting to redo her hair so she could feel the wind on her neck but too on edge to set down her weapon.

Winter stepped out of the Cornucopia, followed by the others over the next few minutes as the sun heated up the space and people woke up. The air was tense, no one speaking unless necessary, the coming actions of the day hanging over them like the sword of Damocles.

Hopefully the Capitol read it as interparty conflict brewing, not the harbinger of their downfall as Cinder knew it was.

A stack of crackers in her hand with beef jerky pinched between her fingers like the cigar of a factory foreman, Cress walked over to hand Cinder a canteen of water, a tight smile on her face. She wore Thorne’s shirt under her jacket instead of her own, the outline of their Deus ex Machina just visible under its looser silhouette. Thorne followed behind Cress, hand on her shoulder and blindfold hanging around his neck.

Cinder snorted on seeing his clothing. His jacket was tied around his waist, and he wore Cress’s shirt, sleeves cut off and arm holes enlarged so he was wearing a cropped tank top. Cinder’s hand on her axe relaxed fractionally and she took a deep breath, allowing the moment of levity to bring her back to earth from the edge of paranoia.

Among the tense, quiet morning as the last of the mist burned off, Ze’ev’s head snapped to the side, and he raised his sword. Cinder dropped her canteen and drew dagger from her belt. All around her her allies had dropped into fighting stances. That was all the warning they had before an arrow whizzed past Jacin and tributes rushed from the woods to the north.

Another arrow flew toward Ze’ev but Scarlet batted it out of the way with her spear. “Defend, don’t rush to engage! Once their fighters close the archers won’t be able to shoot, their aim’s not good enough!”

Two rushing figures had stopped behind scant scrub brush. Three—no, four more rushed toward them at the cornucopia.

Stars, that’s every tribute left.

Cinder twirled her axe and shoved Winter inside the cornucopia. An arrow pinged off its dark side, and then the battle began in earnest, and Cinder had no time to pay attention to archers.

            A trident thrust toward her abdomen and Cinder leaned to one side, the outside barbed spike catching on her already torn shirt and going through her jacket. The hollow-faced tribute in front of her pulled her forward and she stumbled, off balance, her jacket ripping but not soon enough.

She managed to steady herself just before she was stabbed again through the throat, catching the trident under the blade of her axe and stepping to the side.

Her heart was beating out of her chest. Nothing was on her mind but survive.

The boy stepped back to free his weapon. More ready now, Cinder avoided the next thrust and knocked the trident barbs toward the ground before stomping on the shaft with her metal leg, snapping the carbon fiber just below the head of the weapon.

Without thinking her dagger found his throat.

The sounds of clashing steel rang around her. The archers had rushed into the battle, drawing swords. Five tributes fought four of her allies, though Cress was doing little more than frantically deflecting strikes as Thorne behind her tried madly to find something to help.

Cinder rushed forward, but felt like she was running through jello unable to get there fast enough as a sword slipped past Cress’s mad defense and skewered her side.

Time sped up again. The sword drew back for another blow as Cinder’s axe buried itself in the tribute’s chest. The leap she’d taken to get there sent them both tumbling to the ground, and she used the momentum to yank the weapon from his chest.

Cinder had been so tunnel visioned in on the girl who now lay at her feet that she had to check around for immediate threats before dropping on her knees next to Cress. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Scarlet pinning a tribute to the ground with her spear, but noticed nothing else as she ripped open the shirt Cress wore. The bloody but unharmed smart tech, their salvation, fell to the ground beside her and Cinder shoved it to Thorne, who’d dropped beside her.

The sword had passed close to Cress’s right side, underneath her ribs, all the way through. She was pale and breathing shallowly, but still awake. Cinder cursed and shoved a wad of the shirt against the entry wound, guiding Thorne’s hands against the exit wound. Until they could get Jacin free from battle and over here to sew her up, there was nothing they could do but keep her from bleeding out.

A battle cry sounded from right behind Cinder and she turned to see the raised arms of a tribute, spear plunging toward her back. She froze, unable to think fast enough to avoid the strike, just watch as her end sailed towards her.

A spray of blood splattered the side of Cinder’s face, and the spear dropped to the ground.

Standing over her was Winter, sword in her hand.

She didn’t move as the boy fell to the ground, eyes lifeless and throat cut halfway through.

Then the sword slipped from her fingers and Winter dropped to her knees, arms limp. The battle around them had ceased, and six cannons sounded. An after battle stillness settled over them, the seven survivors of the arena seeming to stretch into eternity, before Jacin rushes forward. He stops in front of Winter, pulling her away from the boy she killed, the weapon she swore she would never use again.

Under Cinder’s hands, Cress tries to sit up. Thorne protests but she shushes him as the rest of their group runs over. “Our time is up. We have to move now. If the seven of us aren’t fighting in the next three minutes the Capitol will start sending traps and mutts.”

Her voice is pained, and she stops to take several shaky gasps before sitting up further and reaching her left arm out to wipe her bloody hand on Thorne’s shirt and yank the smart tech away. She typed one handed for only a moment, and the arena was plunged into blackness, before lights flickered on, showing the false dome of the arena far above them. She tucked the tech in her waistband before throwing her arm around Thorne’s shoulder with a pained cry. “Help me up. We need to get to the tribute plinths now. Traps and cameras are shut down, but we only have a few minutes before they take back the system.”

Her face went even paler, ashen, and her legs collapsed beneath her as she stood. A new spurt of blood coated her side.

Cinder closer her eyes. Cress wouldn’t make it out of here if they didn’t do something. “Jacin!”

The man didn’t look up from Winter. Cinder walked over and shook his shoulder. His sword swung toward her in surprise, but she caught it with her metal hand, its edge digging into her palm just a little before screeching off. “Jacin. I know you’re worried about Winter, but we need your help to save Cress. If she doesn’t get treatment she will die, soon. Scarlet will take care of her, but you need to get her to a plinth, grab medical supplies from the tribute center below, and get to a plane so you can fix her up.”

Scarlet took Jacin’s place at Winter’s side and hauled her to her feet. Cinder could now see the blank expression in Winter’s eyes as Scarlet hauled her toward a tribute plinth. Jacin carried Cress toward another.

They couldn’t have more than two minutes left.

Cinder dragged Wolf away from Scarlet, ignoring his snarl. “They’ll be fine, Scarlet is strong. I need you to go with Thorne, be his eyes as he flies out. I have to pilot for Jacin while he saves Cress.”

He didn’t move at first, and Cinder growled with frustration. “We don’t have time to argue about this. We will all see each other again, I promise, but if we aren’t smart about his now, none of us will make it out. Now go.”

With one minute to spare, all seven survivors stood on the plinths, Jacin and Cinder squishing Cress between them so they’d all fit, and she hit one last button on the screen in her hand, sending them all into the darkness below.

Chapter Text

The sky above him darkened with the silhouette of a hovercraft. He watched, anxious, as it settled to the ground in front of him in the wide, uncultivated plain. It was slightly singed, one engine smoking.

He had no idea who had survived. At least one, to fly the ship, but they’d limited communication to avoid the Capitol eye. He’d sent his location, and received short confirmation, but that was it.

It had been months. His messages to the tribute families had gone out just in time for them (and him) to get out of immediate danger, and he’d spent the next several weeks as a fugitive, collecting other fugitives as they moved south. All were accounted for except Scarlet’s grandmother. With his and Iko’s tech expertise and Garrison Clay’s peacekeeper knowledge they’d been able to hijack a hovercraft and fly as far north as they could before it ran out of fuel.

He didn’t care where they were. He just knew it was outside of Panem, and Cinder could find them.

Linh Peony bounced on the balls of her feet next to him as the plane touched down. She had been reluctant to leave her mother and sister but understood she would be killed or worse if she didn’t leave district 3 and go into hiding. It had been a lonely month for her here, in the little camp they’d all built.

This was the first time Kai had seen her smile in weeks, waiting for her other, favorite sister to arrive. The expression looked much more natural on her face than the forlorn look she so often carried now.

A loud creaking sound from the lowering gangplank echoed across the plain, and it refused to drop the last few feet, the hydraulics going out. Kai could see a large pair of boots jumping on it before they gave up, and Ze’ev ducked, jumping down instead. He looked around before spotting his mother, running toward her and scooping her up in a teary hug.

Jacin jumped down next, before helping Winter. Kai couldn’t really place the look in her eyes, but she didn’t seem quite connected to reality, even more so than she had seemed in the Capitol before the games. Jacin spoke to her softly and received a small nod and smaller smile in return before they walked over to Jacin’s dad. Scarlet dropped from the gangplank and walked to join Ze’ev with a sad smile on her face. Not surprised though, as if not expecting her grandmother to be there at all.

Peony bounded away from Kai’s side as soon as she caught sight of Cinder, smacking the hydraulics with a wrench until the door opened properly. A giant smile spread across her face as she saw Peony. She shoved the wrench in a pocket before running to meet her sister. The joints in her metal leg didn’t seem to be working right, and she hadn’t moved far from the ship before Peony toppled her to the ground with the hug, burying her face in the crook of Cinder’s neck.

Kai turned away to allow them their reunion in privacy, and saw Cress and Thorne, still blindfolded, step past them. He walked over, Iko at his side, and put a hand on Thorne’s shoulder as Iko swept Cress up in a hug. “Thorne, it’s Kai, Cress’s mentor from district 3. Iko is the one giving her a hug right now. Jacin’s dad, Ze’ev’s mom, and Cinder’s sister are also here, along with two people I brought to keep safe because they were too close to me to stay in the Capitol, Konn Torin who you probably heard of from the games, and Nainsi, who helped raise me in district 3.”

The blindfolded man had looked uncomfortable upon first stepping off of the hovercraft, but as Kai explained the situation unfolding around him, he seemed to relax. He clasped Kai’s shoulder in return, finding it by following the line of his arm. “Thank you.”

Iko finally let go of Cress, and Kai stepped over to give her a hug of his own. “Cress, you saved us all. I can never repay you.”

He could feel her shrug. “Without the others fighting we would have all died anyway.”

Kai pulled back from the hug and put his hands on her shoulders, staring into her eyes, so much older than when he’d seen her the morning of the reaping. “No, but you truly made this possible. Do not downplay your importance. Your plan saved seven people in the arena, and your warning saved six of us on the outside. You are a hero, Cress.”

Thorne stepped up and took her hand, not fumbling at all, as if he knew, even blind, exactly where she was and how to comfort her. “He’s right, and I’ll remind you whenever you need me to.”

They walked off to look at the tents set up aways off, and Iko went to greet Cinder. Kai wandered up the ramp into the hovercraft. It was just like the one they had stolen, exactly like the ship that had taken him to and from the arena. It wasn’t exactly clean, having been the living space of seven people for months, but it wasn’t too bad.

Up in the cockpit the panel in the center of the floor was lifted, a toolbox set next to it. He crouched down and tried to figure out what Cinder had been working on, but he’d never been one of the skilled laborers in district three, he worked on the assembly line. It looked like a piece of hardware had been torn out and the wires around it worked back together.

He sat down on the floor, leaning against the side of the pilot’s chair, and picked up the loose piece, turning it over in his hands.

“It’s the tracking system.”

Kai almost dropped the thing he was holding, fumbling it in his surprise. Cinder snorted at his mistake and moved nearer from her position standing at the entrance. He handed it over as she sat down opposite him, her back against the co-pilot’s chair. She tossed it into the air and caught it. “We tore this out as soon as we got the plane in the air after leaving the arena, but without it the nav system is weird, and I was worried we wouldn’t be able to find you. I’ve been playing around with the wires.”

Her metal fingers lifted a plate off, showing the inner workings of the piece, and she started messing with it. She wasn’t looking up at him, but her leg brushed against his as she propped her arm on it.

Kai leaned forward and took her hand, tangling his fingers with hers and stopping her fidgeting. The metal of her fingers was cold, and he could feel grease in the joints.

She looked up at him, her other hand dropping to her side and setting down the tacking system. For a moment he just looked into her eyes, deep brown, beautiful, alive. “You’re here.”

Cinder leaned toward him as well. Her gaze studied his face, and he noticed she had a new scar above her eyebrow. “Couldn’t keep me away.”

His free hand lifted to trace the scar with his thumb, before ghosting down to her jaw. Her eyes fluttered closed as his thumb rested on her lips. She drifted closer, fingers playing with his collar.

The sun filtered through the space, dust floating on the beams between them, warming the side of their faces. He could still feel it as he closed his eyes, nose brushing against Cinder’s as he tilted his head.

Needing no further prompting, she closed the last fraction of space between them, lips soft and insistent and warm. Her hand disentangled from where he held it between them and rested on his cheek, metal warmed by the sun and by his fingers.

Kai sighed into the kiss, pulling her closer with a hand around her waist, the other sliding into the hair at the base of her neck. Cinder gasped, breaking the kiss. He opened his eyes to see her, close enough that she was all he could see. The sun created a halo around her, her eyes still closed as the hand that had been at his collar floated up to the back of his neck, leaning their foreheads together. A contented smile spread across her lips. “We’re alive.”